I wanted to do an acting role in a movie that had nothing to do with the music business or in which I would play a singer or a songwriter. When I act, I don't even want to be thought of as Ne-Yo.

— Ne-Yo

I want to write for people that are trying to do some kind of quality music. What I mean by quality music is not so much the trend, what is hot right now. I don't write trendy, I write what feels good and something that feels good will never get old. Timeless music is what I try to shoot for.

— Ne-Yo

Women wanted to be viewed as equals to men. So men were like, 'You wanna be viewed as equal to me, then open your own damn door.' But I still don't view it as an excuse to be an a**hole.

— Ne-Yo

“What I definitely learnt from Michael Jackson is that simple is almost always better. As a songwriter, as an artist period.”

— Ne-Yo

“I'm 100% real, even when what's real is ugly. I don't take any pride in covering up, hiding and lying.”

— Ne-Yo

“There wasn't a lot of R&B cats doing songs at 120 beats per minute before 'Closer,' which I take full credit and responsibility for. That's all good, but it was an experiment. You experiment with something, if it goes good, cool, but you never forget where you come from and R&B is where I come from.”

— Ne-Yo

“I watch cartoons the way most adults watch reality-TV shows.”

— Ne-Yo

“I do not cook. However, if I did, I'd cook all Italian food, all the time.”

— Ne-Yo

“As of right this second my main focus is my new album, it'll be out probably towards the summertime, predominately R&B this time. I had a little stint with the dance music and all of that, which I had a good time with- and I love the audience, I love them for accepting me doing it -but I had to go home on this one. Had to take it back to my roots, and not to say that there won't be one, maybe two songs on there that the dance crowd can get into, but the majority, the girth of the album, will be R&B.”

— Ne-Yo

A lot of time we don't get into politics because we don't believe anything you're saying and we can't understand what you're saying because we ask you question and you tap dance around the issue so much that we forget what we asked.

— Ne-Yo

“Michael Jackson will live forever through the thing that he put all of his life energy into: his music. I will do my part to keep the melody alive, to keep the energy forever changing form, but never ever dying!! Long live Michael Jackson.”

— Ne-Yo

“An idea that will translate really well musically should work visually. I try to write music that you can feel if you were to close your eyes you can see what I am talking about.”

— Ne-Yo

“That is the difference between a good song and a bad song lyrically - if you can listen to it and put yourself in that place, or see that person in that place, normally it is a pretty good song.”

— Ne-Yo

“Grab somebody sexy, tell the hey!”

— Ne-Yo

“I named my album Year of the Gentleman. Just looking at how the essence of what it is to be a gentleman is very much lacking nowadays. Someone said to me that chivalry is dead, and I hated to have to agree, but it's true.”

— Ne-Yo

“This is ridiculous. It's been months and for some reason I just can't get over us. I'm stronger than this. Enough is enough; no more walking around with my head down, I'm so over being blue crying over you.”