Lionel Richie
Lionel Richie
Lionel Brockman Richie, Jr.is an American singer, songwriter, musician, record producer and actor. Beginning in 1968, he was a member of the musical group Commodores signed to Motown Records. Richie made his solo debut in 1982 with the album Lionel Richie and the number-one hit "Truly". He has sold more than 100 million records worldwide, making him one of the world's best-selling artists of all time...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionR&B Singer
Date of Birth20 June 1949
CityTuskegee, AL
CountryUnited States of America
The best compliment that has ever been given to me was, I was at the airport one day and a guy came in and said, 'Lionel, my wife loves you, the kids love you, my mother-in-law loves you, the family loves you.
The music business was not safe, but it was FUN. It was like falling in love with a woman you know is bad for you, but you love every minute with her, anyway.
My first love, you're every breath that I take, you're every step I make
No one can deny, this love I have inside, and I'll give it all to you, my endless love.
I think the whole world is dying to hear someone say, 'I love you.' I think that if I can leave the legacy of love and passion in the world, then I think I've done my job in a world that's getting colder and colder by the day.
In life you must be able to discern between who and what is genuine and artificial. I always try to give people the benefit of the doubt, but I realize that you can't please everybody all of the time and that sometimes you have to just go for what you know.
Country music has always been about as close to R&B as you can possibly get. We're storytellers.
Father' meant to me provider... and I was working myself to death... but I wasn't physically home; I wasn't there every day.
When I was growing up, music was music and there were no genres. We didn't look at it as country music. Popular music in Tuskegee was country music. So I didn't know it in categories. It was the radio.
I knew I was going to do a country album one day. But I was just trying to figure out for the life of me, what we were going to do to make it different, unique.
It was very interesting in my world, because I grew up as a fan and I did not know that there was a thing called R&B, pop, country, classical - I just knew that I loved music.
By growing up in Alabama, I had a melting pot of the whole pie: R&B, gospel, country.
Kids will keep it real. If I've ever had in my life a great anchor, it's them. They get in your head, 'don't get too famous.' If you think you're really famous and think you're really hip, go hang out with your kids for an afternoon. That's about as earthbound as it's going to get.
I want to let everybody know that I'm from there, and country is Tuskegee. Or should I say rather, my country is Tuskegee. I was born and raised there, it's not just someplace I passed through one day.