Neil Peart Quotes & Sayings
Enjoy the top 100 famous quotes, sayings and quotations by Neil Peart.
Famous Quotes By Neil Peart
Standing in front of a microphone where every word or every slip that you make, especially in these times, is with you forever - you want to say the right thing. I fell into having to extemporize, and it came okay because of tools I've learned. I said [to myself], "Remember [to mention] mom and dad." — Neil Peart
Lessons taught but never learned, all around us anger burns. Guide the future by the past. Long ago the mould was cast. — Neil Peart
All preordained
A prisoner in chains
A victim of venomous fate
Kicked in the face
You can't pray for a place
In heaven's unearthly estate
Each of us
A cell of awareness
Imperfect and incomplete
Genetic blends
With uncertain ends
On a fortune hunt that's far too fleet — Neil Peart
And me, I've got to start all over. Not only build a new life, but construct a new person. I call my old self "that other guy," for I share nothing but his memories, and everything he ever liked I've had to discover all over again, one by one, so that I've held on to, for example, reading, motorcycling, and birdwatching, but I'm not yet sure about art or music (I can look at it or listen to it, but not with the same "engagement" I used to), and I have no interest in work, charity, world events, or anybody I don't know. In my present gypsy life, I encounter a lot of people every day, and some of them I instinctively like and respond to in a brief encounter at a gas station or small-town diner, but for the most part I look around at ugly and mean-spirited people and think, "Why are you alive? — Neil Peart
Quick to judge, quick to anger, slow to understand ... prejudice, fear and ignorance walk hand-in-hand. — Neil Peart
Excitement is found along the road, not at the end, and likewise, peace is not a fixed point-except perhaps in the unwanted "rest in peace" sense. PEACE is the breathing space between destinations, between excitements, an occasional part of the journey, if you're lucky. PEACE is a space you move through very rarely, and very briefly-but your not allowed to stay there.
you have to keep moving, and go do what you do.
because you can ... — Neil Peart
You can do a lot in a lifetime, if you don't burn out too fast/You can make the most of the distance/First you need endurance/First you've got to last. — Neil Peart
There's still a lot I'm angry about, a lot of human behaviour that's appalling and despicable, but you choose what you can fight against. I always thought if I could just put something in words perfectly enough, people would get the idea and it would change things. — Neil Peart
Drumming completely eclipsed my life from age 13, when I started drum lessons. Everything disappeared. I'd done well in school up until that time. I was fairly adjusted socially up until that time. And I became completely monomania, obsessed all through my teens. Nothing else existed anymore. — Neil Peart
It's interesting. I've known quite a few good athletes that can't begin to play a beat on the drum set. Most team sport is about the smooth fluidity of hand-eye coordination and physical grace, where drumming is much more about splitting all those things up. — Neil Peart
To me, the highest expression of life is art with jokes. It's very rarified, very difficult to accomplish if you want to be more than just funny and more than just jokes about human gaseousness. — Neil Peart
Our songs were not written to be listened to in headphones or on the radio. They were written to be played. All of the little infinite detail that went into the arrangements and giving ourselves lots of breathing room in terms of playing what we wanted to play and using up any ideas that we had - all of those were conceived to be performed. — Neil Peart
The songs he chose reflected that same withdrawn, private man, but this man had the gift of expressing his inner soulscape through the medium of some of the 20th century's finest songwriters, from Rodgers and Hart to Antonio Carlos Jobim to Jimmy Webb, and as always, making those songs his own. — Neil Peart
I had spindly little ankles, and growing up in Canada, I couldn't skate. I was no good at any sports so was very much a pariah through those adolescent years. — Neil Peart
The Seven Cities of Gold always fascinated me. Southwestern U.S. history especially fascinates me. The whole spur of the Spanish exploration of the Southwestern U.S. was the search for these mythical Seven Cities of Gold. — Neil Peart
I believe in taxation and health care that is outside the usual libertarian mandate, because I don't want people to have to suffer. It's as simple as that. — Neil Peart
Stamina is the force that drives the drumming; it's not really a sprint. — Neil Peart
Whatever is left behind in the passing of a rare talent, so much is always lost. — Neil Peart
At first I would be taken aback by that observation, then I would think of them seeing other drummers on television, often faking it or playing less physically demanding music, and understood why they had that impression. I guess drumming wasn't hard work for every drummer, but it certainly was for me, the way I liked to play - as hard as I could, as fast as I could, as long as I could, and as well as I could. Playing a Rush concert was the hardest job I knew, and took everything I had, mentally and physically. I once compared it to running a marathon while solving equations, and that was a good enough analogy. — Neil Peart
The important thing is: if you fail once, or if your luck is bad this time, the dream is still there. A dream is only over if you give it up-or if it comes true. — Neil Peart
You have to know when you're at the top of your particular mountain, I guess. Maybe not the summit, but as high as you can go. — Neil Peart
Hay farms, scrub forest, and some bald-looking areas of — Neil Peart
There's a new reality born every minute. Unless one is a believer in predestination (in which case I'll call the prestidigitator), or other puppet-like restraints on our powers, one is free to imagine and effect changes on the world. And if enough people do it, there are big changes. These things happen. Anything can. — Neil Peart
Rudimental snare work is something I've always loved. — Neil Peart
Live shows were always religion for us. We never played a show - whether it was in front of 15 people or 15,000 - where it wasn't everything we had that night. — Neil Peart
As crises came up later on - "Oh, we have to compromise, and the record company wants to do this," I'd be like, "No, I don't have to." — Neil Peart
Courageous convictions will drag the dream into existence. — Neil Peart
As the train rolled through the countryside, so lush and green, and into the sprawling suburbs of south London, I stared around at all the strangeness: the narrow little "terraced" houses all in rows of brick and chimneypots, the tiny back gardens with clotheslines and garden sheds, the little cars all on the wrong side of the road - it was all so delightfully foreign, and exotic. My first lesson that the rest of the world really was more different than I knew or imagined. — Neil Peart
I have come to believe that anger and grudges are burning embers in the heart ... — Neil Peart
I'm still no good at ball-and-stick games. If I go play golf with the guys, it's intended to be a joke. — Neil Peart
Getting through Lake Tahoe was already like L.A., with construction all over the place, — Neil Peart
Now I call myself a bleeding heart libertarian. Because I do believe in the principles of Libertarianism as an ideal - because I'm an idealist. — Neil Peart
Throw off those chains of reason and your prison disappears. — Neil Peart
It astonished me in the early Nineties to suddenly have musicians admit that they had been inspired and influenced by us. That meant a lot at that time. But of course, being human, the ... disrespect isn't even strong enough a word, is it? The opprobrium was painful. Being popular and hated is not satisfying. — Neil Peart
Geddy once joked, 'You're the only guy I know who rehearses to rehearse! — Neil Peart
Look in, look the storm in the eye. Look out, to the sea and the sky. Look around, at the sight and sound. Look in, look out, look around. — Neil Peart
It's always a happy day when YYZ appears on our luggage tags. — Neil Peart
I don't like lyrics that are just thrown together, that were obviously written as you went along, or the song was already written and the guy made up the lyrics in five minutes. — Neil Peart
Adventures suck when you're having them. — Neil Peart
We don't want to be Mick Jagger and the Rolling Stones. That type of thing wasn't what we were after. It was most important for each of us to be equal in input and output - each of us has to pull the same amount, musically, in composition and in every sense of being in the band. — Neil Peart
I remain the optimist: you just do your best and hope for the best. But it's an evolving state of mind. — Neil Peart
In 2007, I studied with Peter Erskine because I was doing a Buddy Rich tribute concert, and I wanted to take my big-band drumming up a level. I went over to Peter's house with my sticks, feeling like a 13-year-old again. — Neil Peart
The thing for me about Ayn Rand is that her philosophy is the only one applicable to the world today - in every sense. If you take her ideas, then take them farther in your own mind, you can find answers to pretty well everything on an individual basis. — Neil Peart
The real test of a musician is live performance. It's one thing to spend a long time learning how to play well in the studio, but to do it in front of people is what keeps me coming back to touring. — Neil Peart
Everything that we were, everything we based our lives upon, everything that we believed is gone. In my journal one time, I expressed the feeling of hurt that I carry around, so similar to the feeling of being betrayed, and I concluded that I had been betrayed, by Life itself, and that's pretty deep. So, the betrayed ones, like you and me, have to start all over again, from Absolute Zero, and construct some new version of "Life," one that we can "live with." No way we can hold onto what we used to believe, and no way we can forget what has actually happened in our lives, and in our worlds. We will never trust Life again. — Neil Peart
There is no blood in jazz drumming, and there are no bullies in jazz drumming. — Neil Peart
For me, drum elements are like hieroglyphics - I think of a certain physical figure, and a little three-dimensional glyph will appear in my mind as I'm playing. — Neil Peart
All four winds together can't bring the world to me Shadows cast a play of light, so much I want to see Chase the sun around the world, I want to look at life-In the Available Light. I'll go with the wind, I'll stand in the light. — Neil Peart
Thoreau, At death, our friends and relatives either draw nearer to us, and are found out, or depart farther from us, and are forgotten. — Neil Peart
When Mr. Ludwig invented the bass-drum pedal, that's what made the drum set possible. — Neil Peart
All the world's indeed a stage
And we are merely players
Performers and portrayers
Each another's audience outside the gilded cage — Neil Peart
If you want something done right, just forget it. — Neil Peart
If it's cross-country ski season, I'll be out doing that, or snowshoeing up in Quebec. In my California home, I go to the local Y and I like doing yoga. It's been hugely beneficial to me in injury avoidance. — Neil Peart
To get nostalgic about other people's music, or even about your own, makes a terrible statement about the condition of your life and your prospects for the future. I have no patience with that kind of attitude, whether it's on radio or among friends. — Neil Peart
Let your heart be the anchor and the beat of your song. — Neil Peart
If you've got a problem, take it out on a drum. — Neil Peart
From first to last, the peak is never passed. Something always fires the light that gets in your eyes. — Neil Peart
Better the pride that resides as a citizen of the world than a pride that divides when a colorful rag is unfurled — Neil Peart
I am the audience. I want to observe people. Even when I'm playing drums onstage, I'm watching people. I'm looking at them and their faces and their T-shirts and their signs. And travelling by motorcycle, especially, the world is just coming at me. — Neil Peart
Without knowing it, I had identified a subtle but important part of the healing process. There would be no peace for me, no life for me, until I learned to forgive life for what it had done to me, forgive others for still being alive, and eventually, forgive myself for being alive. — Neil Peart
I can worship Nature, and that fulfills my need for miracles and beauty. Art gives a spiritual depth to existence
I can find worlds bigger and deeper than my own in music, paintings, and books. And from my friends and family I receive the highest benediction, emotional contact, and personal affirmation. I can bow before the works of Man, from buildings to babies, and that fulfills my need for wonder. I can believe in the sanctity of Life, and that becomes the Revealed Word, to live my life as I believe it should be, not as I'm told to by self-appointed guides. — Neil Peart
If I do something weird, play it twice and it's a new part. — Neil Peart
People say to me, 'Are you still excited when you go on tour?' Should I be excited about leaving my family? No, and no one should. It's as simple as that. If you put aside the fantasy of it, it is what it is and has to be done. And that's fine, and I pour my entire energy and enthusiasm into it, but of course, I'm of two minds about the whole idea. — Neil Peart
When I started playing, I played in R&B bands. I played James Brown, Wilson Pickett, Otis Redding and all that. — Neil Peart
Like a force of nature
Love can fade with the stars at dawn. — Neil Peart
It was actually drumming that gave me the stamina to get into sports later. I started playing drums at 13, and when I got to the international touring level ... I got interested in cross-country skiing, long-distance swimming, bicycling ... things that require stamina, not finesse. — Neil Peart
Anytime I have an idea, I'll make sure that I put it down so that when we do sit down to write an album, I don't have to dream it all out of thin air. I don't have to be creative on the spur of the moment, or spontaneously artistic. I just take advantage of whenever creativity strikes. — Neil Peart
When I'm riding my motorcycle, I'm glad to be alive. When I stop riding my motorcycle, I'm glad to be alive. — Neil Peart
I want to be an improviser, and I've worked very hard at that. It's an art. You don't just play whatever comes into your head; you have to be very deliberate about what you do. — Neil Peart
Playing a three-hour Rush show is like running a marathon while solving equations. — Neil Peart
If you choose not to decide you still have made a choice. — Neil Peart
It seems to me that's the only way you can have a truly creative aggregate of people is if they're all contributing in different ways. — Neil Peart
Innocence gave me confidence to go up against reality. — Neil Peart
Half the world hates
What half the world does every day
Half the world waits
While half gets on with it anyway — Neil Peart
For me to call myself a musician, it's necessary to play live, and it rewards so much - not just in the pay cheque sense but what it does for my playing. I feel it through a tour - I feel it at the end of a tour - all that I've gathered, and especially now that I am improvising so much. — Neil Peart
I even felt a vicarious guilt, like a German meeting Jewish people in Poland who had never heard of the Holocaust, or that there were Jews in America, and trying to explain it to them. Ashea, I wished I could say. Ashea. — Neil Peart
No one gets to their heaven without a fight. — Neil Peart
When I was young, my ambitions were very modest. I thought, 'If only I could play at the battle of the bands at the Y, that would be the culmination of existence!' And then the roller rink, and you work your way up branch by branch. — Neil Peart
Those who know what's best for us must rise and save us from ourselves. — Neil Peart
Waiting for the winds of change to sweep the clouds away. Waiting for the rainbow's end to cast its gold your way ... You don't get something for nothing. You can't have freedom for free — Neil Peart
More a paraphrase than a quote, really, but it comes from a prayer which was stitched into a sampler above my grandmother's bed. It began like this: 'Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep ... ' — Neil Peart
But glittering prizes and endless compromises shatter the illusion of integrity. — Neil Peart
Perils of solitude #1: People talk to you. I'd rather listen. — Neil Peart
Though his mind is not for rent
Don't put him down as arrogant
His reserve, a quiet defense
Riding out the day's events
What you say about his company
Is what you say about society
Catch the mist, catch the myth
Catch the mystery, catch the drift
The world is, the world is
Love and life are deep
Maybe as his skies are wide
Today's Tom Sawyer
He gets high on you
And the space he invades
He gets by on you
No his mind is not for rent
To any god or government
Always hopeful, yet discontent
He knows changes aren't permanent
But change is
What you say about his company
Is what you say about society
The world is, the world is
Love and life are deep
Maybe as his eyes are wide
Exit the warrior
Today's Tom Sawyer
He gets high on you
And the energy you trade
He gets right on to the friction of the day — Neil Peart
What is a master but a master student? And if that's true, then there's a responsibility on you to keep getting better and to explore avenues of your profession. — Neil Peart
If I have to travel, I'm going to travel my way and travel in the real world. And I'm going to have conversations every day with people in rest stops and people in gas stations and people in hotels and diners. That nourishes me. — Neil Peart
It's not the music you hear in your head that other people are going to hear. You have to be able to make it true enough to the image in your head, and that's where technique and technology come in, for sure, and knowledge. It's not true and will never be true that someone who knows nothing can sit in a basement and make great music. — Neil Peart
I had come to appreciate the long open stretches of two-lane highway across the sagey sea and mountain-studded plateau of the Great Basin, but the towns and cities were another thing. I liked the natural face of Nevada, but was not as impressed by the human face. — Neil Peart
The government's only functions are to protect the rights of the individual; therefore, you need a police force and an army. — Neil Peart
I've heard the stories. Like, Eric Clapton said he wanted to burn his guitar when he heard Jimi Hendrix play. I never understood that because, when I went and saw a great drummer or heard one, all I wanted to do was practice. — Neil Peart
You can twist perception
reality wont budge
you can raise objection
I won2t be judge and jury — Neil Peart
I try not to repeat myself in fills in all the Rush songs unless it is something simple or something I feel is my own characteristic thing. — Neil Peart
You just become adaptable and try to lead a good life in ways that make sense, regardless. Because I know at the end of it, if I'm going to meet Jesus or Allah or Buddha, I'm going to be all right. — Neil Peart
Howard Roark stood as a role model for me - as exactly the way I already was living. Even at that tender age [18] I already felt that. And it was intuitive or instinctive or inbred stubbornness or whatever; but I had already made those choices and suffered for them. — Neil Peart