Shawn Amos Music Quotations

Musicians burn through more cash than the Federal Reserve.

While not a musician, my father was a music agent for years before becoming pop culture icon Famous Amos.

Music and philanthropy have a long, benevolent relationship with one another. Record bins are rife with charity singles, and concert history is filled with benefit shows for every imaginable cause. Musicians like to give back.

From their '61 Cavern Club debut to their last rooftop concert eight years later, The Beatles gave every serious artist in their wake the songbook and sound for their career. It's the musical trough from which nearly every musician drinks.

Memphis is the place where rock was born and Martin Luther King, Jr., was killed. It's full of contradictions, abject poverty, and riches that only music can provide.

Harlem's Apollo is probably the most well-known music hall in the world.

Protest is patriotic. Since the beginning of musical time, American singers and songwriters have used their talent and bully pulpits to show us America's strengths and shortcomings.

Thomas Dolby is part mad scientist, part nature boy, and entirely moved by the power of music.

Many cities make music, but no city breathes music quite like Memphis. The songs and sounds that come from here are uniquely American.

At its best, American music is the soundtrack of our long - and often painful - march toward a more perfect union.

From chain gangs to folk songs to intelligent soul, America has created musicians dedicated to truth, justice, and a better American Way.

Year after year, we see a new crop of musicians who do their best to look tough in lipstick and makeup. Maybe it's a cry for help, an admission of their strong feminine side, or the realization that they don't look so good any other way. Whatever the reason, makeup is as rock n' roll as a Marshall stack.

There was a time when a musician was forced to act in a video. Seeing a singer step too far outside of his comfort zone to pour all of his high-school-drama angst into a poorly scripted scenario was a sight to behold.