Lou Reed Quotes & Sayings

I'm writing about real things. Real people. Real characters. You have to believe what I write about is true or you wouldn't pay any attention at all. Sometimes it's me, or a composite of me and other people. Sometimes it's not me at all. — Lou Reed

You do this because you like it, you think what you're making is beautiful. And if you think it's beautiful, maybe they think it's beautiful. — Lou Reed

The baby sits in front of MTV watching violent fantasies, while Dad guzzles beer with his favorite sport only to find his heroes all coked up. — Lou Reed

Perfect Night has that magic and it has the raw energy that grabs you by the throat. — Lou Reed

It's depressing when you're still around and your albums are out of print. — Lou Reed

I am bigger and stronger than ever. My Chen Taiji and health regimen has served me well all of these years, thanks to Master Ren Guang-yi. I look forward to being on stage performing, and writing more songs to connect with your hearts and spirits and the universe well into the future. — Lou Reed

Take a walk on the wild side. — Lou Reed

When I was in college, I had a jazz radio show. I called it 'Excursion on a Wobbly Rail,' after a Cecil Taylor song. I used to run around the Village following Ornette Coleman wherever he played. — Lou Reed

I always thought martial arts was the most modern choreography we could have right now, and I always wanted to put it to music. — Lou Reed

When I record an album I'm trying to get as close as possible to that perfect moment. — Lou Reed

Here's to Mulberry Jane
She made jam when she came
Somebody cut off her feet
Now jelly rolls in the street. — Lou Reed

Let's do what you fear most
That from which you recoil
But which still makes your eyes moist — Lou Reed

There's only X amount of time. You can do whatever you want with that time. It's your time. — Lou Reed

Anyone who ever had a heart,
He wouldn't turn around and break it.
Anyone who ever played a part,
he wouldn't turn around and fake it.

Sweet Jane — Lou Reed

I don't really think about what the subject of my next album will be. I just know that I'm going to make another album. — Lou Reed

People think that I work out but it's all t'ai chi. — Lou Reed

Over what guilty spirit to not hear the beating, to not hear the beating, but only tears of perfect moan, only tears of perfect moan. — Lou Reed

The currents rage so deep upon us, this is the age of video violence. — Lou Reed

I'll tell ya, I'm a genuinely nice guy. I really am. A real nice guy. But I think I'm temperamental. — Lou Reed

Why don't you swallow razor blades? — Lou Reed

She's my best friend, better than a dog or car. — Lou Reed

The president's dead, no one can find his head, its been missing for two weeks. But no one seemed to notice it. — Lou Reed

The heart says what only the heart knows. — Lou Reed

They put the thing down your throat so you don't swallow your tongue, and they put electrodes on your head. That's what was recommended in Rockland State Hospital to discourage homosexual feelings. The effect is that you lose your memory and become a vegetable. You can't read a book because you get to page 17 and have to go right back to page one again. — Lou Reed

I have no control over the audience. I have no idea what they think. My heart's pure. I can't do anything. I really can't do anything. I don't know what goes on in the crowd. — Lou Reed

The music business doesn't interest me anymore. — Lou Reed

People can vote for who ever they want. That doesn't mean I have to go near them. — Lou Reed

I had started also studying because I wanted to learn more about power and fighting. — Lou Reed

I'll be your mirror
Reflect what you are
In case you don't know
I'll be the sun
The wind and the rain
The light on your door
To show that you're home.
When you think the nights as in your mind
Bent inside, you're twisted and unkind
Let me stand to show that you are blind
Please put down your hands, cause I see you.
I find it hard
To believe you don't know
The beauty you are
But if you don't
Let me be your eyes
A hand to your darkness
So you won't be afraid.
When you think the nights as in your mind
Bent inside, you're twisted and unkind
Let me stand to show that you are blind
Please put down your hands, cause I see you.
I'll be your mirror — Lou Reed

All I want to do, is write rock and roll that you could listen to as you got older, and it wouldn't lose anything; it would be timeless, in the subject matter and the literacy of the lyrics. — Lou Reed

When critics ask you if you feel vindicated by other critics - I didn't like critics then, and I don't like them now. There you go. I've always been outside the mainstream, and it stayed that way. — Lou Reed

One chord is fine. Two chords are pushing it. Three chords and you're into jazz. — Lou Reed

But it's the things that preceded it that made that happen, and of course now someone like me thinks, well, if I can do that ... then there are a lot of other things that are possible. — Lou Reed

Some even claim that I'm a terror, a dictator and they're right. — Lou Reed

If someone teaches you alignment and - I'm not a tai chi expert by any stretch - so interviewing me about tai chi is kind of the cart before the horse - but just from my point of view as a student, it's simply that Master Ren can show you the relationship of power, stance and form. — Lou Reed

I think it's pretentious to create art just for the sake of stroking the artists ego. — Lou Reed

It always bothers me to see people writing RIP when a person dies. It just feels so insincere and like a cop out. To me, RIP is the microwave dinner of posthumous honours. — Lou Reed

And I feel just like Jesus' son — Lou Reed

But I'm also talented and I know when I created something great and Perfect Night is something great, no doubt, no but. — Lou Reed

Don't the people you're around shape the music, is that what you're saying? Everything does. — Lou Reed

The injuries we do in kind are visited upon us often. In the science of the mind, trying hard to move a shadow. — Lou Reed

I've never been super confident about anything. The work is never as good as it could be. — Lou Reed

I would like to live to a ripe old age and raise watermelons in Wyoming. — Lou Reed

I'm tearing down Route 80 East, the sun's on my right side. I'm drunk, but my vision's good. — Lou Reed

The myriad choices of his fate
Set themselves out upon a plate
For him to choose
What had he to lose — Lou Reed

To debate political objectives, views, and goals is the most American thing conceivable. — Lou Reed

I don't like the word rock opera, but I'm trying to write on that level that's reserved for plays still, or novels. — Lou Reed

An eye for an eye is elemental. — Lou Reed

You're going to reap just what you sow — Lou Reed

The rich son waits for his father to die, the poor just drink and cry. — Lou Reed

The gay people know where I'm at. Straight people may not know where I'm at, but they find it kind of interesting when they show up and see what is sitting around them. — Lou Reed

You're a musician: You play. That's what you do. — Lou Reed

You know, when you're relaxed, you're putting it out there, and then it comes, oh, I can do that. — Lou Reed

They say no one person can do it all
But you want to in your head
But you can't be Shakespeare and you can't be Joyce
So what is left instead

You're stuck with yourself and a rage that can hurt you
You have to start at the beginning again
And just this moment
This wonderful fire started up again

When you pass through humble, when you pass through sickly
When you pass through, I'm better than you all
When you pass through anger and self deprecation
And have the strength to acknowledge it all

When the past makes you laugh and you can savor the magic
That let you survive your own war
You find that that fire is passion
And there's a door up ahead, not a wall

- "Magic And Loss" The Summation — Lou Reed

I cleaned up my act because otherwise I would have kicked the bucket. — Lou Reed

Jealousy endlessly eats through my mind, and jealously endlessly makes me be unkind. — Lou Reed

I wanted to be an actor. That was my real goal. But I wasn't any good at it, so I wrote my own material and acted through that. That's my idea of fun. I get to be all these things in the songs. — Lou Reed

Magic And Loss (The Summation)
They say no one person can do it all
But you want to in your head
But you can't be Shakespeare and you can't be Joyce
So what is left instead
You're stuck with yourself and a rage that can hurt you
You have to start at the beginning again
And just this moment
This wonderful fire started up again
When you pass through humble, when you pass through sickly
When you pass through, I'm better than you all
When you pass through anger and self deprecation
And have the strength to acknowledge it all
When the past makes you laugh and you can savor the magic
That let you survive your own war
You find that that fire is passion
And there's a door up ahead, not a wall — Lou Reed

Research, research, research. It means everything. — Lou Reed

This violent rage that turned inward cannot be helped by drink. — Lou Reed

It's the music that kept us all intact, kept us from going crazy. — Lou Reed

Some people are like human tuinals — Lou Reed

Well all tai chi has the martial aspect to it, a lot of people don't know, a lot of the teachers won't show it, or they do show it but you don't really learn it, what the application is. — Lou Reed

But I found tai chi when I was studying with Leung Shum, who teaches Eagle Claw and Wu Hao. — Lou Reed

As the dead rise to live, the live sink to die, the currents are deep and raging inside. — Lou Reed

How can anybody learn anything from an artwork when the piece of art only reflects the vanity of the artist and not reality? — Lou Reed

You can't beat two guitars, bass, and drums. — Lou Reed

There were lots of things that I recognized from my experience with Eagle Claw and Wu Hao, and here was the combination of the whole kit and kaboodle, the whole tamale in one. — Lou Reed

Life is like Sanskrit read to a pony. — Lou Reed

I wouldn't want to hear Beethoven without beautiful bass, the cellos, the tuba. It's very important. Hip-hop has thunderous bass. And so does Beethoven. If you don't have the bass, it's like being amputated. It's like you have no legs. — Lou Reed

You know, some people got no choice, and they can never find a voice, to talk with that they can even call their own. So the first thing that they see, that allows them the right to be, why they follow it, you know, it's called bad luck.. — Lou Reed

I think life is far too short to concentrate on your past. I rather look into the future. — Lou Reed

Things always seem to end before they start — Lou Reed

I don't mind a repetitive chorus; I mind repetitive verse. I mean, it's the same amount of space. Why would you have only three diamonds if you can have six? — Lou Reed

I like druggy downtown kids who spray paint walls and trains. I like their lack of training, their primitive technique. I think it hurts you, when you stay too long in school. — Lou Reed

One of my rules is: Never listen to your old stuff. — Lou Reed

I was a product of Andy Warhol's Factory. All I did was sit there and observe these incredibly talented and creative people who were continually making art, and it was impossible not to be affected by that. — Lou Reed

Raymond Chandler managed to write about L.A. his whole career. Should I keep going writing about New York? Is that what I should be doing? Songwriting doesn't work that way. — Lou Reed

Underachievers of the world unite, you have nothing to lose except your fright. — Lou Reed

I love Ornette Coleman. I love Don Cherry. I love the way those guys play. — Lou Reed

Writhe and sway to music's pain searing with asides, caress death with a lover's touch for it shall be your bride. — Lou Reed

With Master Ren, if I'd tell him I can't do that and he'd say, yes you can, and it turns out I very much can do it. — Lou Reed

Well, everybody does something, some people race cars, others collect stamps, I find tai chi to be philosophically, aesthetically, physically and spiritually fascinating. — Lou Reed

I never liked the Beatles. I thought they were garbage. — Lou Reed

I'm not leaving New York. And neither is anyone else. We're here. We are quintessential Americans - we're not only American, but New York-American. — Lou Reed

I can create a vibe without saying anything, just by being in the room. — Lou Reed

Some people drink to unleash their libidos, and other people drink to prop up their egos. — Lou Reed

If anyone ever had a heart
He wouldn't turn around and break it
If anyone ever played a part
he wouldn't turn around and hate it. — Lou Reed

Senator, it has been reported that you have had illegal congress with your mother. — Lou Reed

Between thought and expression lies a lifetime. — Lou Reed

You can't ask me to explain the lyrics because I won't do it. — Lou Reed

You won't see my parents honored on any stamps. — Lou Reed

I am very emotionally affected by sound. Sounds are the inexplicable ... There is a sound you hear in your head, it's your nerves, or your blood running. — Lou Reed

I think it's important that people don't feel alone. — Lou Reed

When I saw that combination of grace and power, the fast and the soft, the yin and the yang, that's what I'd been looking for. — Lou Reed

That's why I survived because I still believe I've got something to say. — Lou Reed

Speaking in a common tongue, speaking through guitars and drums. — Lou Reed

Caroline says as she gets up from the floor, you can hit me all you want to, but I don't love you anymore. — Lou Reed

I don't know what goes on in the crowd. I've had them show up and throw beer cans at me. I caused riots in most of the major cities. — Lou Reed

And no kinds of love are better than others.

Some Kinda Love — Lou Reed