Rock N Roll Bands Quotes & Sayings

Rock n' roll as a genre is different from pop and hip hop: it is about bands, and that for me suggests brotherhood, family, friendship and community. — Steven Van Zandt

I was trained at classical piano as a youngster back in PA. To rebel, I bought a drum set and played in some rock & roll bands. In college I picked up a guitar and became obsessed with practicing which led to playing guitar in indie rock bands in the mid 90's. Which led me to Los Angeles. — Jeff Cardoni

I played in garage bands and rock and roll bands when I was in junior high and high school and saw some of the great talents of all time in the local area where I lived. — David Cassidy

People didn't know certain things about me, which ... I was out of creative writing class in school, Syracuse University; had a B.A. in English and wanted to write the great American novel but I also loved rock and roll. I was in bar bands all through college, playing fraternities and have to know all the songs in the top 10. That kind of thing. — Lou Reed

I know it's financially lucrative to go out on my own, but I don't like it. It's really hard work, just the performance aspect. I like people who look like they've been together for too long and sound like they've been together too long. I like rock n' roll bands. — Jason Isbell

Hanoi Rocks was our baby and we were the core and we started the band. All those years that went to waste because of that accident, it's only right that we have some kind of advantage because it's our history. The name 'Hanoi Rocks' I think is one of the very best names, if not the best name of all rock n' roll bands. — Michael Monroe

Australia is so entrenched in rock n'roll and bands, and that's just the way Australia is. — Ricki-Lee Coulter

When I was a kid growing up in Kentucky, on lucky summer nights, my cousin would pick me up in his Chevy Super Sport and drive me down along the Ohio River to Cincinnati to hear some rock 'n' roll. Those were exciting times, and the bands would play late into the night, rocking soaked in sweat. When I hear the Ready Stance, these memories come back to me and I remember that Cincinnati has produced so many wonderful musicians. The Ready Stance is among that number. You will be hearing a lot about them in the future. — Chris Frantz

I had a jazz trio, a rock n' roll band, and I played drums in junior high, high school, college, big bands, and I played timpani in the symphony. I am a drummer. It's the one instrument I actually play pretty well. It's just hard to carry on your back. — J. D. Souther

I like all like classic rock bands like The Beatles and The Who and stuff and Led Zeppelin so I kinda dress like that. Kinda retro I guess. Well not retro but, like tight. I don't know. Like just jeans and shirts. I don't know. Kinda rock and roll I guess. — Drake Bell

The nose can't help catchin' what the ears get sick with. Yessir, rock bands just sweat evil. Evil's been around for a long time, ever since rocks started getting real hot and making a lot of noise as they exploded out o' the ground and evil spirits wisped out of hell. If a band ever uses a fog machine, hold your breath so you don't become possessed by one. — M.C. Humphreys

Most people get into bands for three very simple rock and roll reasons: to get laid, to get fame, and to get rich. — Bob Geldof

There's no leader of this band, and there never will be. That's the key. You can't control how the public perceives you-people see rock'n'roll bands as the guitar player and the singer. — Shannon Hoon

The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame is a joke - the fact that Madonna is in before Rush and Kiss. Those two bands have influenced so many groups and people other than in metal. — Corey Taylor

I had done a lot of rock 'n' roll photography when I was in college. I was one of many photographers who worked for The Doors, Jefferson Airplane, and all of these rock 'n' roll bands. — John Dykstra

I just got into it like a lot of people through the rock 'n' roll bands in the late '60s that turned to country music, like The Byrds and Buffalo Springfield, but particularly through The Byrds because of Gram Parsons, Roger McGuinn and Chris Hillman (with their 1968 album Sweetheart of the Rodeo). They kind of introduced English kids to Merle Haggard and George Jones and the Louvins (brothers Charlie and Ira). — Elvis Costello

I haven't heard anything new that I've liked on the show. A lot of the bands we play with are just bad, especially those alternative rock bands. They can do it in the studio but they can't play live... I see the audience applauding while they're playing, and I wonder if it's just because they're fans of the band and don't care, or out of spite. Because it certainly isn't because they sound good.

Branford Marsalis on the musical acts booked on The Tonight Show. — Branford Marsalis

I'm also performing regularly in Southern California with two bands. As a solo artist doing acoustic sets and a member of the Jenerators, my rock n roll band that has been around for a long time now. — Bill Mumy

The bands and the roadies, love 'em and leave 'em. It's pleasure to try 'em, but trouble to keep 'em. — Joni Mitchell

Its cool when I meet young guys from other bands who say how much an impact Aerosmith has had on them and how much they like me.I'll give 'em that 'C'mon you don't mean that' routine, but in my heart I know where they're coming from. If I had grown up in the '70's and was into rock n' roll, I know the kind of impact Aerosmith would have had on me. I know the kind of impact that Elvis and Jagger had on me, and while I'm not comparing myself to those guys, I can relate. — Steven Tyler

Early on, before rock 'n' roll, I listened to big band music - anything that came over the radio - and music played by bands in hotels that our parents could dance to. We had a big radio that looked like a jukebox, with a record player on the top. The radio/record player played 78rpm records. When we moved to that house, there was a record on there, with a red label. It was Bill Monroe, or maybe it was the Stanley Brothers. I'd never heard anything like that before. Ever. And it moved me away from all the conventional music that I was hearing. — Bob Dylan

The world is full of bands and bullshit, and if I'm doing a stupid art project like rock 'n' roll then I want to spare my audience as much as possible. — Ariel Pink

I'm like a middle-aged person; when my friends go on about modern bands, I don't know what they are talking about. I'm into rock n' roll, like Jimi Hendrix. Not so much because of my parents, who used to play a lot of Nina Simone and older blues, but my brother and sister. — Georgia May Jagger

A more important reason is that the bands will intuitively trust someone they think is a peer, and who speaks fondly of the same formative rock and roll experiences. — Steve Albini

Rock n' roll was one thing, and then they chopped off the 'roll' and called it 'rock,' which became a sort of umbrella term for anything with a guitar in it. Like hair bands. How could we possibly believe that? It's just gotten downright silly, to the point where now it's sort of become like professional wrestling. — Tom Petty

I'm an out and out basic man and AC/DC are one of the best rock'n'roll bands in the world, doing things just to the basics, you know. — Brian Johnson

Rock and roll and swing never quite mixed. Rock and roll came in and just blew everything out of the water. Big bands were dead. — Brian Setzer

I judge people based solely on the quality of bands on the black concert t-shirts they wear. — Lou Brutus

Rock 'n' roll accepted me and paid me, even though I loved the big bands ... I went that way because I wanted a home of my own. I had a family. I had to raise them. Let's don't leave out the economics. No way. — Chuck Berry

Daltrey was by all accounts the toughest man in the Who; maybe the toughest man in London. Filled with blue collar attitude, he strutted around the stage, screaming out the rage of a century of London's dead end lives, roaring like a young lion trapped in a decadent, dying England. Townsend wrote prettily, daydreaming foolishly individualistic dreams of artistic expression, but it was Roger's sledghammer voice that smashed the skulls of the enemy. — Dave Marsh

I never went to rock concerts when I was a kid. I didn't see any rock & roll bands. I had posters on my wall. I had Beatles records. — Dave Grohl

You want a showman, go see rock 'n' roll bands today. You want to have a shamanistic experience, get psychedelic, then you watch The Doors. — Ray Manzarek

Keith Richards on change - "It's gotta go up and down. Otherwise, you won't know the difference. It would be just a bland, straight line, like lookin' at a heart machine. And when that straight line happens, baby, you're dead. — Jessica Pallington West

I love rock and roll. Sometimes I feel like I was born in the wrong decade because I love Led Zeppelin and Jimi Hendrix and ... those are my bands. — Marisa Miller

I had 12 years of classical music as a child, playing piano competitions as a teenager, playing in blues bands and rock 'n' roll bands, country and jazz bands. I played in about any situation. — Ronnie Milsap

I wasn't in a lot of rock and roll bands. I was in jug bands and things when I was in school. — Loudon Wainwright III

Don't ask me why I obsessively look to rock 'n' roll bands for some kind of model for a better society. I guess it's just that I glimpsed something beautiful in a flashbulb moment once, and perhaps mistaking it for prophecy have been seeking its fulfillment ever since. — Lester Bangs

There's a great rock and roll scene in Sweden. There are many smaller bands like ourselves that are great. Oh yes, there's a band called Eggstone, they're really good, and a band called the Soundtrack Of Our Lives, which is excellent. — Nina Persson

Scary rock n' roll bands had all the devilish imagery. But at the same time, it's not because they were devil worshippers, they were saying that society is run by devils. It was human society that created these things, they become the devils. This is what you worship. This money is what you worship. This idea is what you worship. — Immortal Technique

The '60s was a magical time in the music business. So much creativity and talent. I think a lot of it came from the fact that we had grown up before rock n' roll. We listened to all the great songwriters and big bands, songs with great lyrics and melodies. I think that really influenced everybody. — Frankie Valli

I'm 33 ... before AC/DC I've played in a lot of bands in Australia. You're never too old to rock and roll. — Bon Scott

When I first got famous, Greg Dulli was also just starting to cook with the Afghan Whigs, and because of the MTV awards I met Dave Grohl and Nirvana and all these rock and roll bands. So I had experience with what it was like when people were taking off at that time. — Denis Leary

The street's alive as secret debts are paid, Contacts made, they vanished unseen. Kids flash guitars just like switch-blades Hustling for the record machine. The hungry and the hunted explode into rock'n'roll bands That face off against each other out in the street, down in Jungleland. — Bruce Springsteen

There's always gonna be rock n' roll bands, there's always gonna be kids that love rock n' roll records, and there will always be rock n' roll. — Dave Grohl

I grew up listening to blues and rock 'n' roll and other music, but, legitimately, the Stones is one of my favorite bands in the world. — Ato Essandoh

I don't think I understood guitar rock as well as I probably should have. I don't think I understood bands like Led Zeppelin. In their era, everyone had such a regard for them because of them ushering in rock n' roll and this larger-than-life lifestyle. But then they had these songs that would just not stop. I didn't fully get it. — Pete Wentz

Through the history of rock n' roll, you see lots of bands making the mistake of putting on the tights when they get to arenas. Don't do that. — Patrick Carney