"It's hard - some people get inspired by a feeling, but I'm mostly inspired by melodies." - Avicii

"There's always haters, no matter what you're doing - whether they're complaining that everything you do sounds the same, or it's too different." - Avicii.

"There's always so much music around me now, it seems like everything has to be something with music, so in my spare time I try not to listen to anything. It's so hard for me to listen to something without trying to see a benefit in it: "Maybe I'll make my own version of that track or maybe I'll do this or that." When I'm off, I just don't want to hear anything." - Avicii

"Dance music is like a virus, it has infected so many different genres." - Avicii

"I don't really look at the charts at all. If anything, I try to out-do what I've done before. I try to make music that I like and trust my own judgement with what will work with a wider audience. If you compare yourself to the charts, you lose perspective on what you're doing and why you're doing it." - Avicii

"I've always had a fascination with making your own music but never have been skilled enough to play the instrument, so to be able to make music without the ability was awesome." - Avicii

"I've always been a producer - that's how I see myself first. The deejaying came second as a way for me to be able to perform." - Avicii

"I always just sit down at the piano and make the main hook - what I want the track to be about melodically - and then I'll build everything else around that. But growing up, I did not play any instruments." - Avicii

"House music originated in America, and it has always been around, but I guess it just got a tighter hold on Europe and other parts of the world." - Avicii

"I actually only started listening to house music around the time I started making it. I got hooked both to making music and to house music." - Avicii

"To me, I'm always trying to look for the energy, to imagine it being played on the dance floor. I guess that's the most important thing in making music for me." - Avicii

"I'm good at melody - I'll write the top-line melody and ideal words I want to go with. But I'm not that good at writing lyrics. I bounce back and forth with songwriters or someone who can sing." - Avicii

"When it comes to electronic music, I started listening to a lot of Daft Punk, way before I knew what house music was, and then progressed into a lot of Steve Angello, Eric Prydz, Axwell, Sebastian Ingrosso, and Laidback Luke." - Avicii

"For me, there are two types of country: There's the shoot-yourself-in-the-head country, and there's the really good country music." - Avicii

"My dad has always been a big Ray Charles fan, and I've grown up listening to all kinds of music." - Avicii

"I grew up listening to a lot of Ray Charles and '60s rock, thanks to my father, and then my brothers got me in to KISS and whatnot, so I guess that's where I got my first taste for music." - Avicii

"Lyrics are important, but it's hard, because English isn't my first language - although it feels like it is these days! I grew up with amazing melodies, so getting that right on a song has always been the key thing for me, but there's no reason why a great melody doesn't deserve great lyrics." - Avicii

"If I wanted to make a quick buck, there's far easier ways of doing it. What I want is to provoke people. If you want a hit song, all you need to do is rewrite an old song. It might have been proven to work, but you won't be remembered the same way." - Avicii

"I love finding out-of-the-box inspirations and blending them with what I've done in the past. And when I started to experiment with genres, it didn't sound forced. Maybe that's because it's all music I listened to growing up, and it's all music that I love." - Avicii

"I was definitely very focused already, I was already really driven, and spending almost 24 hours a day working on music ... I was really dedicated." - Avicii (2012)

"I just feel so happy that I'm one of the few people who can actually say that I love what I'm doing. To have gotten to the point where I'm at today, it's amazing. I still can’t believe it." - Avicii

"Originality is definitely missing from EDM. There are people looking for it and exploring but I feel it's so big now it is just getting milked. House music is losing all its melody as it becomes more about how dirty the drop is and how energetic it is. It loses touch with what music really is." - Avicii

"The scene was not for me. It was not the shows and not the music. It was always the other stuff surrounding it that never came naturally to me. All the other parts of being an artist. I'm more of an introverted person in general. It was always very hard for me. I took on board too much negative energy, I think." - Avicii (2016)

"I just feel happy. I feel free at this point. Like I have my private life back and focusing on myself for the first time in a long time. This was obviously the hardest decision of my life so far. But so far it has paid off tremendously in terms of well-being for me. I'm happier than I have been in a very long time. I can't say I'm never going to have a show again. I just don't think I'm going back to the touring life." - Avicii (extract from Avicii's 2016 interview with Billboard on retiring from touring at 26)

"We all reach a point in our lives and careers where we understand what matters the most to us. For me it's creating music. That is what I live for, what I feel I was born to do. Last year, I quit performing live, and many of you thought that was it. But the end of live never meant the end of Avicii or my music. Instead, I went back to the place where it all made sense - the studio. The next stage will be about my love of making music to you guys. It is the beginning of something new. Hope you'll enjoy it as much as I do." - Avicii (2017)

"Now that I have more time in the studio, I want to learn as much about other genres as possible. That's what I love the most - having a session with Nile Rodgers, for instance, and getting an understanding of music that's invaluable." - Avicii (2017)















