Quote collection
282 quotes — follow a thought to its full quote page.
"Popular music is like a big party, and it’s a thrill sneaking in rather than being invited. Every once in a while, a guy with his shirt on inside out, wearing lipstick and a pillbox hat gets a chance to speak."
"I don't really like listening to the radio so much."
"Jesus Christ, this godamn rain, will someone put me on a train."
"Got 27 children I never see."
"It's new, it's improved, it's old fashioned."
"If you're a writer you know that the stories don't come to you, you have to go looking for them. The old men in the lobby: that's where the stories were."
"Well, they'll bark you down like carneys, sell you Christmas cards in June."
"Most changes in music, most exciting things that happen in music, occur through a miscommunication between people "I thought you said this." Poetry comes out of that too."
"Sometimes words are just music themselves. Like 'Chicago' is a very musical sounding name."
"I don't know what the 'big time' is."
"It wasn't good for my nerves, that kind of work - a fireman. I've got high blood pressure. I get upset easily. I don't think that was a proper career alternative for me."
"I never looked at music as a serious venture. There was very little encouragement from my family. I didn't have anybody to entertain, so it was hard to get motivated."
"My friends think I'm ugly, I gotta masculine face."
"I know a girl, she been married so many times, she got rice marks all over her face"
"All medical procedures require two hands, so in a sense it's like when you play an instrument. That's what they call things that they use in their work: They call them instruments. A lot of people start out majoring in medicine and drop it and change their major to music."
"I really like your playing"
"When it's raining you can't find enough things to catch it in. When it's not you can stand out in the middle of the street in a dress and a funny hat and nothing's gonna make it rain. I go through periods - or spells - when I'm more receptive."
"Disneyland is Vegas for children."
"It's terrible for the culture of music. Like anything that is purely economic, it ignores the most important component."
"There's a lot of intelligence in the hands.When you pick up a shovel, the hands know what to do. The same thing's true of sitting at the piano."