Some Favorite Quotes ~ Music Related ~
"Ringo is Ringo, that's all there is to it. And he's every bloody bit as warm, unassuming, funny, and kind as he seems. He was quite simply the heart of The Beatles." -- John Lennon. ~ Ringo was the only one of the three remaining ex-Beatles who visited Yoko when John died.
"We've known each other since we were 4 years old. We are very different people in many ways. It's strange. We know when to stay apart and when to let things bring us together. We can't get divorced. You can get rid of the old lady, but I can't get rid of Mick, and he can't get rid of me." -- Keith Richards, on Mick Jagger
"There are more love songs than anything else. If songs could make you do something we'd all love one another." -- Frank Zappa, during the congressional music censorship hearings.
"An intellectual snob is someone who can listen to the William Tell Overture and not think of The Lone Ranger." -- Dan Rather
"There are all sorts of cute puppy dogs, but it doesn’t stop people from going out and buying Doberman's." -- Angus Young, on AC/DC’s enduring appeal.
"I have big nuts. huge nuts. Elephantitis of the balls – that’s what I have." -- Eminem
"Optimism is a choice. Cynicism isn’t smarter - it's just safer." -- Jewel
"It don't matter what your doin’, just as long as you look good doin’ it" -- David Lee Roth
"As long as there are kids who are pissed off and have no real way in venting out that anger, heavy metal will live on" -- Ozzy Osbourne
“You ain’t goin’ nowhere, son. You ought to go back to drivin’ a truck.” -- Jim Denny , manager of the Grand Ole Opry, to Elvis Presley in 1954.
"I once asked [John] Lennon what he thought of what I do. He said 'it's great, but its just rock and roll with lipstick on'." -- David Bowie
"Rock 'n roll is like a drug. I don't take very much, but when I do rock 'n roll, I fuckin' do it. But I don't want to do it all the time 'cause it'll kill me." -- Neil Young
"We would try to play other people's songs, but we just couldn't play them. We played them so badly, we decided to write our own songs." -- Bono , U2
"The silence between the notes is the good part for me. I find that to be a very important part of music that is often lacking." -- Leon Redbone
"We don't like their sound, and guitar music is on the way out." -- Decca Recording Co. rejecting the Beatles, 1962
"Anything that is too stupid to be spoken is sung." -- Voltaire
"A lotta cats copy the Mona Lisa, but people still line up to see the original" -- Louis Armstrong, on the copying of his original style.
"We really thought that when we went to America and played them [R&B] it wouldn't work, because it was their music. We didn't realize that the white kids had never heard that music." -- Bill Wyman, the Rolling Stones
"Funk is rhythm and blues without rules. Funk is music that makes your neck and your hips move in ways you can't practice." -- Alan Leeds, tour manager, the James Brown Band
"After [the Sex Pistols] there can never, ever be a rock and roll band again. It's finished now. . .and had its day." -- Johnny Rotten, the Sex Pistols
"Punk. . .was more a kind of do-it-yourself, anyone-can-do-it attitude. If you only played two notes on the guitar, you could figure out a way to make a song out of that, and that's what it was all about." -- David Byrne, Talking Heads
"Anyone who says rock and roll is a passing fad or a flash-in-the-pan trend along the music road has rocks in the head, dad!" -- Alan Freed
"Don't compromise yourself… it's all you've got." -- Janis Joplin
"The worst crime I could think of would be to pull people off by faking it, pretending as if I'm having 100% fun." -- Kurt Cobain
"Hair is the first thing. And teeth the second. A man’s got those two things, he’s got it all." -- James Brown ~ (what about Soul, Jim?)
"People have this obsession. They want you to be like you were in 1969. They want you to, because otherwise their youth goes with you." -- Mick Jagger, ‘93
"Rock and roll: The most brutal, ugly, desperate, vicious form of expression it has been my misfortune to hear." -- Frank Sinatra
"Just because you like my stuff doesn't mean I owe you anything." -- Bob Dylan
"Writing about music is like dancing about architecture - it's a really stupid thing to want to do" -- Elvis Costello
"Rhythm is something you either have or don’t have, but when you have it, you have it all over." -- Elvis Presley, on his early lack of control below the waist.
"I wanted to say to Elvis Presley and the country that this is a real decent, fine boy." -- Ed Sullivan, during Elvis’ third appearance on his show, January 6, 1957
"Soul music taught us how to move our ass." -- Eldridge Cleaver
"Music is everybody's possession. It's only publishers who think that people own it." -- John Lennon
"We don't see eye to eye, but we have a common interest: your money." -- Johnny Rotten, announcing the rationale for the 1996 reunion tour of the Sex Pistols.
"One thing's for sure, the next LP is going to be very different." -- John Lennon, after wrapping up the Revolver album. (Setting us up for Sgt. Peppers...)
"I have unwittingly helped to invent and refine a type of music that makes its principal proponents deaf." -- Pete Townshend
