“Shy Carter helped me write ‘One Call Away.’ He is a brand new artist. I really want to help jumpstart his career because I think he’s super-talented.”

I was carrying my friend in his casket to put him in the hearse, and I was thinking, ‘I need to write a song for this guy, because he always told me I would have a No. 1 song.’

I don’t love the whole Hollywood mentality, but I do love the weather and how motivated everyone is around here. It motivates me to make fun music. I’m an East Coaster – I’m from New Jersey, so I’ll probably feel like that forever.

I listened to a lot of Marvin Gaye and Motown records.

When I get high anxiety, I vomit. My mom was so stressed out. Then I found out I was staying in John Mayer’s old dorm room, and I had a nice roommate. That completely brought me down. I was completely comfortable at Berklee.

One of my goals is to find an unsigned YouTube artist and feature them on my album. That’s what I wished someone would’ve done for me.

I started making remixes for every specific girl I wanted to date. That’s how I learned how to use Pro Tools, and then I started making my own music.

I’ve always made weird sounds with my mouth. I’ve always been fascinated by the sound design, what you can do with your mouth. I was the kid dancing around in third grade on the basketball court. While everyone would be playing sports, I would be jumping around.

It’s crazy because I have a scar on my right eyebrow, but people who don’t know me very well think that I just intentionally shave that part of it.

I started piano when I was four. My mom taught me. And then I went to Manhattan School of Music during high school, like every Saturday. And then I went to Berklee for college, in Boston.

When Marvin Gaye made his music, he evoked this feeling that would reach everybody.

I’ve always weaseled my way into Grammy parties to network and everything, but now I have a legitimate reason to be there – it’s so cool.

The scar on my eye is a result of the doctor’s sewing up my face. It was 450 stitches and plastic surgery.

Everyone’s gone through a breakup, and I’ve dated girls in the past where… I’ve never had a messy breakup, thankfully, but I’m never the one to end it. I’m always caught off guard as to why things ended because I guess I’m oblivious in a way.

When I wrote ‘Marvin Gaye,’ my whole intention was to make a record that people would put on a record player… and just instantly make out with each other.

If a girl sings a sexy song, I actually become even more attracted to them.

It’s very easy for people to put out music.

I trust in you, Lord, but keep helping me in my moments of distrust and doubt.

I think as you grow up, you realize you have obligations just in your life – being a citizen, being part of humanity – to help other people, to help your country, to help the world.

God, help me to see others not as enemies or as ungodly but rather as thirsty people. And give me the courage and compassion to offer your Living Water, which alone quenches deep thirst.

My mission in heaven will be to draw souls, helping them to go out of themselves to cling to God, with a spontaneous, love-filled action, and to keep them in that great interior silence which enables God to make his mark on them, to transform them into himself.

It’s not easy that everything you do, everybody has to come in and critique it and give their opinion. Sometimes it does help me and sometimes it hurts me as a person. That’s life. I have feelings.

I can turn heartbreak into songs that help other people.

All parents damage their children. It cannot be helped. Some parents smudge, others crack, a few shatter childhoods completely into jagged little pieces, beyond repair.

Christians are like manure: spread them out and they help everything grow better, but keep them in one big pile and they stink horribly.