You can learn a lot about the musical year that was 2007 through the insights of the artists who were playing, singing and writing those songs.

Here is just some of what they had to say:

FALL OUT BOY’S LYRICIST-BASSIST PETE WENTZ: “If our band is this big, anyone who picks up a guitar can do it. We are the most ordinary people on the planet. At the end of the day, we’re just boys from Midwest gone wrong (he laughs).

…“There’s something people can attach themselves to through us. We’re not the prettiest bunch of people around and we’re not even the greatest live band, but there’s something about it that touches people. We have twice the heart of a lot of other bands. We put our head down and don’t come up for air.”

THE KILLER’S BRANDON FLOWERS: “I’m not afraid to say the Killers are here to keep the ball rolling (musically). Someone has to do that or it will stop. We look up to a lot of the same bands that everyone else does. Musicians have got to get to the headspace where the Stones and other bands were in just opening a blank page and do whatever you want to do. We are so stuck thinking we can’t do certain things. If you listen to that you’re putting a wall up. We are a band that has broken down that wall.”

JOSH GROBAN: “I like to make people realize they are not alone in the emotions they are feeling. I always turned to music either to feel more comfortable about things I was feeling, or to allow me to feel things I never felt. It is a visceral thing that makes you feel not alone. Hopefully my music can do that and inspire people the way it has inspired me to do so many different things.”

DEREK TRUCKS: “If you can listen to a culture’s music, it is easier to understand the culture a little more openly across the board. Sometimes you want your music to be a tip of the hat to people who influenced you, and you feel their music should be heard, their story be known. We feel fortunate as a band that we can leave sign posts for people to get turned on to music that maybe they haven’t heard. You can hear a style that sends you to a place that can be a really profound, moving moment.”

CHRIS DAUGHTRY: “Being on ‘American Idol’ was great. I say all the time I would do it all over again if I had too. Luckily I don’t. It definitely got me to show people what I did, so it’s definitely a great platform to launch a career.”

MY CHEMICAL ROMANCE BASSIST MIKEY WAY: “We want to be an inspirational kind of band. We are just trying to open people’s eyes to a lot of things going on in the world, helping people feel better.

“We always like to have people get their own meanings out of songs. That’s where things like this really hit the nail on the head, the fact an album like ours has its own meaning for different people. A lot of people plug their lives into it. “…Music is like our salvation. It’s almost like our religion, what we believe in and stand for.”

BRANDI CARLILE: “I hope my music helps people in some way, or they can interpret it and listen to it and have a good time with it, maybe move past something they are trying to move past. It’s not that it’s always heavy. Sometimes they are love songs or good old fashioned rock’n’roll.”

“…When writing a personal song, anytime you are creating something with the idea of doing that and putting it out (for people), it is a little intimidating, especially when you are trying to communicate really yourself. You think, ‘If they don’t accept it, what if nobody likes these songs, what does that say about who you are?’ ”

GYM CLASS HEROES’ TRAVIS McCOY: “We just make music for anybody who listens: high school kids, middle aged women or someone else. What makes us special is that it is hard to put a face on our audience.

“…When we’re writing them, we never expect songs to communicate to so many different people. When I write it’s about something I’m feeling, but I realize I’m not the only one going through the feelings. It’s really cool that someone else gets to feel something I wrote personally.”

KEANE’S TIM RICE-OXLEY: “Every once in a while, we (the UK) produces a band or a record that makes a leap forward that really inspires bands throughout the world. We want to be that for our generation.

“…I don’t think we could ever make an album that didn’t take honesty and great songwriting as its basic principles…I think people can tell when they hear our music that our songs are brutally honest, and that’s not something you get very often these days. People are too concerned with how their words will be judged.”

STAIND’S FRONTMAN AARON LEWIS: “I pay attention to the music and (try to ignore) everything else. That’s why I’m here, not to see my face on a magazine or on TV. I’m not here to be at every cool function I can go to, all the hip ‘who’s who’s. I could (care less) about any of that s----. That’s a hindrance to me. If I can do what I do successfully and not have all those other things attached to it, I’d do it in a heart beat.”

PAT METHENY: “All but a few seem to need music in some way in their lives. I see it as a reminder of where we came from and where we are going.”

“…I feel lucky to get the chance to continue the research. Trying to find good notes and play well has be the focus of pretty much every waking minute of my life since I was about 12. To get to really address that in life is something very special and a real privilege.”

EVANESCENCE’S AMY LEE: “I’m an expresser, a creator, so I’m constantly just putting it out there and getting it off my chest, so people relate to that. I think a lot of people appreciate that and it makes me feel wonderful. I feel like I’ve been able to unload my baggage. Not only by releasing it have I gotten it out of my system, but it’s actually helped other people get through the same thing. It’s actually a real miracle sometimes”

“…I’m a goof ball. I’m a normal person. I release so much of my baggage into the music, but I feel like I can be normal and healthy in real life. The music is just my therapy; it’s my outlet for all those negative things.”

UMPHREY’S McGEE’s Joel Cummins: "I don't see how being compared to Phish can be a bad thing, as long as we are not compared to the Back Street Boys, it will be okay (laughter). Those guys (Phish) were a real band and made real music. Our philosophies of music are pretty close. We're not trying to go after their sound per se, but we have a lot in common with how we go about constructing stuff that makes sense."

THE USED’S JEPH HOWARD: “To me personally, music is the only thing on earth that can change or enhance a mood. It’s more real than anything. The feeling you get from music makes you feel alive. It’s something you can count on all the time. Just by listening to your favorite band or favorite record you’re having a better day. You can count on it.”

RELIENT K’s frontman Matt Thiessen: “I hope we don’t come across like a rock star. We’re just kids lucky enough to play our guitars on stage. We are so normal.

“One of the most important things is that influence we have on kids to try and encourage them. To me that’s more important than album sales or selling out shows. Affecting even one kid (positively) is one of the coolest things you ever could do as far as being in a band, or not being in a band. That is kind of the worldview for the rest of us as well: doing something greater than solidifying our career. That is what we are all about.”

ROBERT CRAY on his advice to new musicians: “Just do what you love doing and stick to that…You just have to be yourself. People can be themselves, make their own recordings at home, put it on the Internet and, who knows, maybe get a lot of hits, and then everybody comes looking for you. The big challenge (with technology) is to open up and see where the flow goes. A lot of good things can be accomplished with that. Now you can have your own Web site and release things when you want on the Internet.”

SUSAN TEDESCHI: “It’s so easy to feel pressured and do what others want. You really have to find what it is you want to do. It’s being honest with what you do and love. If you don’t really love what you are singing about, people are able to tell outside and that will eat at you on the inside. The best thing is to do what you love and feel in your heart, and make music that is positive and will help people. There’s so much negativity in the world. It’s really important to focus on the positive.”

(FOLK LEGEND) GARNET ROGERS: “Basically, I’m trying to eliminate myself from the picture. It’s not about me, but the song and the audience. For me, every night if I can come off the stage and not remember anything I did, that’s usually a good night. That means I lost sight of myself.

“…Music is your soundtrack to what’s going on around you. It provides a rhythm and a background and a poetry to what is going on around you. It helps inspire some kind of framework to your life, particularly when it doesn’t have a framework.”

SARA WATKINS OF NICKEL CREEK: “It’s really nice to catch people off guard. This really appeals to me. It’s a big compliment. People are basically opening up to being affected by you, by something that has not been put in front of them before. It’s a very big privilege.”

AL SCHNIER, a founder of moe., on how he judges the success of each moe.down festival: “The numbers count, but more importantly I need to feel good about the music we put out there. The cool thing about moe.down is the diversity in the music. We have everything from indie rock to jambands, bluegrass to reggae, singer-songwriters to alternative rock. moe.down has always stressed quality live performances from undiscovered young bands to rock vets. It has remained true to its original vision, a three-day camping and music festival featuring a diverse line-up of some of our favorite bands, hosted and headlined by us.”

IRON AND WINE’S SAM BEAM: “Unlike a lot of other art forms, we react to music on a purely emotional level. It’s one of the good things in life.”

FRONTMAN AL BARR OF DROPKICK MURPHYS: “We are only 50 percent of what makes up the show. The other 50 percent comes through the door. Together we reach that goal. That's the beauty of what we do and get to do together. With people coming and singing along it makes a great show. That's what makes it so successful."

KORN’S FRONTMAN JONATHAN DAVIS: “Take an orgasm and amplify it like 1,000 times and that’s what playing live feels like. It feels amazing. Sometimes I get in that zone and I’m just flowing through the music, I call it a ‘stage-gasm,’ where I just jump out of my body and look back at myself. It’s the most, it’s a trip. It freaks me out, but it’s so frigging intense and killer. It’s just when I think the band reaches the peak in the crowd, cause I mean the crowd’s 100 per cent of it too. The crowd’s going off and the band’s going off and we all peak at the same time. It’s just ‘Bam!’ that happens, and it’s an amazing, amazing feeling.”

SOLOMON BURKE: “Music is a healing instrument, a healer around the world for everyone. It has no color barrier or race or creed. It just has a message: ‘If you like me, I’m here. If you don’t, stay tuned, something is coming next.’ ”…(On choosing a song) “If you don’t feel it, don’t do it. If it doesn’t relate to you spiritually, mentally, don’t do it, it’s not going to last. Try to make a song last

JONATHAN EDWARDS: “I determined early on in the life of my charting success that I was out there doing what I loved and I believed I was making a difference in people’s lives and so I saw little reason to change. I let all the ‘change’ take place in the people around me while I endeavored to keep on being the person I was before my songs were on the radio.”

THURSDAY GUITARIST STEVE PEDULLA ON THE BAND’S APPROACH TO MUSIC: “You learn some of the rules, try to understand them and then break them. “…Getting too involved (with the music industry) can definitely pull you into a black hole of sorts. It can make you lose sight of the music. We see this happening to lots of artists out there. I don’t think the music industry is different than we thought it would be.”

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