“Truly saying sorry is never easy to do, and when you are, you just hope it’s not too late.”
― Justin Tranter
“A little makeover never hurt nobody.”
― Justin Tranter
“Even though L.A. can be kind of tacky, when a city’s big draws are The Roxy and the Viper Room, you know its pretty amazing.”
― Justin Tranter
“The only thing that’s serious to me about music is making sure marginalized people are included in the story.”
― Justin Tranter
“The Knife can’t stop cloaking brilliant pop songs in voodoo jam blankets.”
― Justin Tranter
“I first fell in love with music when I was five years old because of ‘Annie.’ And then ‘The Little Mermaid’ really made me want to start singing. And then the fierce, amazing women of the ’90s – Alanis Morrissette, Courtney Love, Tori Amos, Ani Difranco, Paula Cole, Patty Griffin – made me want to start writing.”
― Justin Tranter
“Most of my friends are my friends because they inspire me.”
― Justin Tranter
“’World Is Our Playground’ is a big room banger that makes you wanna check into a hostel and call Mike Taylor.”
― Justin Tranter
“I’m using the success I’ve had to help other people shine.”
― Justin Tranter
“I just didn’t really relate to Kurt Cobain. There was nothing very glamorous about him.”
― Justin Tranter
“You can tell if something feels special. But there are so many moving parts involved in making the song a hit. The radio has to deliver, the management has to deliver in terms of booking the right promotions… just being a good song isn’t enough.”
― Justin Tranter
“I love to give the song away – it’s so exciting – where, I think, a lot of younger songwriters, they struggle with that. And it’s a big struggle, where they want the shine and they want people to know that it was their idea and it was their doing. But luckily, I’ve been through that, so I can just focus on helping other people do their thing.”
― Justin Tranter
“My success happened pretty late in life. I can’t even believe it happened.”
― Justin Tranter
“I shot a gun one time in New Zealand. An entertainment news program there thought, since the band was called Semi Precious Weapons, they would bring us to a gun range.”
― Justin Tranter
“The one time I shot a gun, the feelings I felt, I was guilty for feeling them. There is an exhilaration and a glamour, and I felt awful for feeling that.”
― Justin Tranter
“For me personally, I’m anti-gun and always have been and always will be. But I’m definitely not someone who is looking to abolish the Second Amendment. I think we’re definitely interpreting it wrong.”
― Justin Tranter
“I’m not famous. I work with famous people.”
― Justin Tranter
“Good art should be polarizing.”
― Justin Tranter
“I don’t like labels.”
― Justin Tranter
“I am a genderless sea creature who has been writing and studying music since I was 12.”
― Justin Tranter
“I love songs, Patty Larkin, Sharon Stone, Mae West, and Marilyn Monroe.”
― Justin Tranter
“My choice of shoe upsets people a lot more than my filthy mouth.”
― Justin Tranter
“I think that because we have these big female pop stars, people forget that women and marginalized people are so underrepresented in this business.”
― Justin Tranter
“For the most part, it’s straight white men running these labels and publishing companies.”
― Justin Tranter
“I’m fortunate that I have a female publisher, and her boss is a man of color. My world is a little more diverse, but the majority of the business is not diverse at all.”
― Justin Tranter
“Once I got into pop songwriting, I was kind of just ready to help other people tell their stories… I’m here to facilitate and structure and grow and make things a little more fabulous and a little more urgent.”
― Justin Tranter
“Beyonce, Stevie Nicks, Ani DiFranco, Cardi B – Women tell awesome stories.”
― Justin Tranter
“Being a songwriter, you are accepting that this isn’t about you. If you do want it to be about you, you’re going to be really miserable.”
― Justin Tranter
“I just want to make music that people hear, and I’m not ashamed of that.”
― Justin Tranter
“I want to make sure in every song we write that women are given power.”
― Justin Tranter
“Obviously, Gaga’s one of the greatest music visionaries of our time, and Beyonce is one of the greatest visions of our time. She is a music visionary, too.”
― Justin Tranter
“When you are born gay, you are born into a rich culture of politics, music, and art, but you are also a minority in your own home.”
― Justin Tranter
“A man in high heels is the most dangerous thing in the world.”
― Justin Tranter
“I’m so connected to the community that I was lucky enough to be born into.”
― Justin Tranter
“My goal is that my makeup and style will inspire Midwestern housewives. I want there to be a breakdown of ‘Justin’s smoky eye’ in Cosmo.”
― Justin Tranter
“The larger streaming grows, the less money there will be to get the music out there, which, to me, is the sad part.”
― Justin Tranter
“This is the dream: to make money off of what you love.”
― Justin Tranter
“I was born into the most amazing family an underdog could be born into, and I was born into the LGBTQ community. And what a beautiful community we are. The art, the music, the fashion, the brains, the fight, the survival skills, the diversity, male, female, non-binary, Gender Non Conforming, cis, trans, femme, and all races.”
― Justin Tranter
“I feel like there is a lot of homophobia and misogyny in the music business, and I feel like I’ve gotten to a place where I’ve broken down a lot of those doors.”
― Justin Tranter
“I’ve had the experience of going through homophobia in my work, and I can share my experiences so future generations don’t have to deal with what I’ve dealt with.”
― Justin Tranter
“I won’t do press anymore unless I can talk about the homophobia and let queer people know our ideas are mainstream.”
― Justin Tranter
“Music spoke to me when I was young in such an intimate, empowering, magical way, and I think that music is already doing that for young queer kids.”
― Justin Tranter
“I like to play this game where I ask people to count gay pop writers and producers they know. Everyone’s always like, ‘Oh, there are plenty!’ But we always end up counting them on one hand.”
― Justin Tranter
“I really want queer kids to know that our experience is universal.”
― Justin Tranter
“The thing is, if you tell your story specifically enough, it becomes so universal. Just because you’re a gay man singing an honest love song, people should know that it’s about men and that they can still relate to it.”
― Justin Tranter
“I know that it’s my queer perspective that’s helping people make songs that the world is listening to.”
― Justin Tranter
“When I’m in a session with an artist, my job is to help execute their vision – so it’s whatever story they’re telling, and the news doesn’t specifically affect that.”
― Justin Tranter
“I really loved Kygo and Selena Gomez’s ‘It Ain’t Me.’”
― Justin Tranter
“If I’m hanging out with my friends or I’m working out, I’ll listen to female singer-songwriters from the ’90s because that’s where my heart lies.”
― Justin Tranter
“If a song I’m lucky enough to be a part of comes on the radio, it’s definitely really cool and exciting, but I can’t focus on anything but the song. Same if one of my songs comes on in a restaurant. I can’t just carry on a conversation.”
― Justin Tranter
“I worked at a jewelry store to pay the bills when I first moved to N.Y.C., and I always loved the phrase ‘Semi Precious.’ So I wanted to just call the band Semi Precious, but my dad told it was kinda sissy, so I added Weapons.”
― Justin Tranter
“If you listen to Semi-Precious Weapons’ last single, ‘Aviation High,’ you can definitely hear that even in my old band, even in the songs I was writing then, the pop influence really started to take over.”
― Justin Tranter
“Pop just means popular – it can be any genre, and if it becomes popular, then it’s pop music.”
― Justin Tranter
“Great music is just very clear. Sonically and lyrically, you understand the point of view, you understand the melodies, you understand the vibe, and you understand the lyric pretty damn quickly. To me, that doesn’t make it ‘less than’ – it makes it ‘more than.’”
― Justin Tranter
“I’m a walking political statement.”
― Justin Tranter
“My mom has a big ol’ crush on Arne Duncan, so I hear about and see pics of him all the time. I think he could look great in heels!”
― Justin Tranter
“Gaga the person is much like Gaga the celebrity. She is very sweet, loyal, and funny with her fans, and she is very sweet, loyal, and funny with her friends. On stage, she is over-the-top, ridiculous, dirty, and genuine on stage, and she is very over-the-top, ridiculous, dirty, and genuine with her friends.”
― Justin Tranter
“My fashion is inspired by Tina Turner and Sharon Stone.”
― Justin Tranter
“We really like L.A. because it really likes rock and roll.”
― Justin Tranter
“For me, as a performer or a songwriter, Stevie Nicks is always a huge inspiration as well as Iggy Pop.”
― Justin Tranter
“I love myself. I love my friends.”
― Justin Tranter
“In the band Semi-Precious Weapons, I got to sing, wear, and say exactly what I wanted for ten years.”
― Justin Tranter
“All songwriters are known as ‘topliners’ because the vocal goes on top of the track.”
― Justin Tranter
“A couple of days working with Joe Jonas, I thought, ‘This guy is a slayer of a singer; he’s really funny, goofy, and sexy. We need to write that.’ And that led to ‘Cake By The Ocean.’”
― Justin Tranter
“I was borderline deluded to think something as outrageous as Semi Precious Weapons could have been mainstream.”
― Justin Tranter
“I’m so grateful for my endless delusion.”
― Justin Tranter
“The beauty of letting marginalized people tell their own stories is it isn’t only the right thing to do socially, but it’s also the right thing to do financially. People love the truth, and people like to spend money on the truth.”
― Justin Tranter
“If a song is being written for a woman, there should be a woman in the room collaborating.”
― Justin Tranter
“Young women should be telling stories of other young women. And if the superstar who is an amazing storyteller isn’t a writer, that’s totally fine, but we should get a young female writer in the room to work on that song with us.”
― Justin Tranter
“I’ve experienced some really very obvious, direct homophobia – when I was still trying to be an artist, behind the scenes, being told to be less gay, be less feminine.”
― Justin Tranter
“I was very lucky that my family really supported me in exploring my femininity when I was young, and so it was a joyous thing.”
― Justin Tranter
“It’s interesting to see the more femme that you present yourself, the more people sort of dehumanize you.”
― Justin Tranter
“I really do pride myself on being able to help other people tell their stories and bring out the best in them. But I still, every song I’m writing, I still need to relate to it. I still need to find my true self in it, or else it’ll feel dishonest. I mean, everything has a queer meaning as far as I’m concerned.”
― Justin Tranter
“I like to make glamorously informed songs for glamorously intelligent people.”
― Justin Tranter
“A lot of writers don’t know what it feels like to get on stage. They don’t understand the weight that songs can carry. I got a chance to play all these shows. I got a chance to define myself through music, so when it comes to helping other people figure out what they should say, I’ve been through it.”
― Justin Tranter
“My artist career failed pretty miserably multiple times.”
― Justin Tranter
“Before anything else, my favorite thing as a fan of music was to make up my own story as to what it means.”
― Justin Tranter
“I didn’t want a day job anymore, so I somehow made the jewelry line work. Now that I look back on it, it was, like, the dumbest idea ever. Everyone and their mother has a jewelry line, so in retrospect, maybe not the smartest fallback plan. But it ended up working out great!”
― Justin Tranter
“People are always quick to judge SPW because of the fact that I wear heels. For me, I just have no choice. This is just how I feel beautiful and how I feel awesome. I would just be so uncomfortable onstage if I was wearing something else.”
― Justin Tranter
“Under-sung vocals can be very sexy because of the intimacy, but they can be just as heartbreaking for the same reason.”
― Justin Tranter
“If you think of ‘Chandelier,’ Sia’s singing her heart out about all those moments before she got sober, and that’s one way to convey emotion and make people hear every word.”
― Justin Tranter
“When I saw Courtney Love in 1994, I knew what I wanted to do. The minute I saw a female-fronted rock n’ roll band, that changed my life.”
― Justin Tranter
“I wouldn’t want to write a song in a pair of sneakers. I think it would be a horrible song.”
― Justin Tranter
“When we were starting out as a band in New York, we played a concert at a small club early on and asked Lady Gaga to open for us. We were big fans, and she had the same kind of approach to music as we did: not taking everything so seriously and just having fun.”
― Justin Tranter
“The fans that fall in love with you at the show are always the most passionate.”
― Justin Tranter
“I thought I was a superstar at 12.”
― Justin Tranter
“My existence is rock n’ roll.”
― Justin Tranter
“In every school, there’s always the kid who gets it the worst, and I was, for sure, that kid. Every time you had to get in a line that was boys and girls, it was like my worst nightmare. A lot of kids I know got made fun of for being gay; that was not my issue: I was just called a girl endlessly.”
― Justin Tranter
“The bullying was so bad that I got to go to the arts high school instead.”
― Justin Tranter
“In some ways, it’s more rewarding to hear someone interpret a piece of music that you’re a part of.”
― Justin Tranter
“For me, as a kid desperate to make music, I thought the only way I could do it was to try to be a superstar – which is a fun thing to be, but it can be exhausting and degrading.”
― Justin Tranter
“I’m really proud of ‘Kissing Strangers.’”
― Justin Tranter
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