Sex Pistols Quotes & Sayings

It's not every day you get to create a band like the Sex Pistols, and what it changed, on a musical level. I love that we've done something that was important. — Steve Jones

I think in that context, when a generation of kids is that ignorant of their recent history, it does a good job of showing what the Pistols were standing for. It's current and it's in the air, partly because I think nothing contemporary is as extreme or as strongly stated as what The Sex Pistols were able to do in their time, in the '70s. I think the reason to [make the film] is that their ideas are still alive: the defense of the right to be an individual, and questioning everything you read, and questioning all the information that's bombarded increasingly at you. — Julien Temple

The Sex Pistols was a part of my life. Just a small part. — Steve Jones

Here is how the harmful becomes profitable: That which yesterday was reviled today ends up in Urban Outfitters. The critic Rebecca Solnit has summarized it this way: 'Eat your heart out on a plastic tray,' say the Sex Pistols. Now, we know where to buy the tray and what the heart tastes like. — Josh Kun

The English scene got more media attention with their emphasis on fashion, with the safety pins and all. There were some really good bands over there. The Sex Pistols were great. — Greg Ginn

I'm not an anarchist any more. I still love the Sex Pistols, but I don't want to be a punk rocker all the time, but I do want to carry on exploring new forms of acting. — Nicolas Cage

No one ever sounded like The Slits or looked like them, no matter how many people tried it, or were influenced by it. It's impossible. You can't recreate that. There will never be another Sex Pistols. There will never be another Clash. — Ari Up

Well, I thought the Sex Pistols were the cream of the crop. They came in and topped everybody, for sure. They took all the existing strands and made a perfect package out of them. — Richard Hell

I can appreciate that," says Henry. He's adding to the list. I look over his shoulder. Sex Pistols, the Clash, Gang of Four, Buzzcocks, Dead Kennedys, X, the Mekons, the Raincoats, the Dead Boys, New Order, the Smiths, Lora Logic, the Au Pairs, Big Black, Pil, the Pixies, the Breeders, Sonic Youth ...
Henry, they're not going to be able to get any of that up here." He nods, and jots the phone number and address for Vintage Vinyl at the bottom of the sheet. "You do have a record player, right?"
My parents have one," Bobby says. Henry winces.
What do you really like?" I ask Jodie. I feel as though she's fallen out of the conversation during the male bonding ritual Henry and Bobby are conducting.
Prince," she admits. Henry and I let out a big Whoo! And I start singing "1999" as loud as I can, and Henry jumps up and we're doing a bump and grind across the kitchen. Laura hears us and runs off to put the actual record on and just like that, it's a dance party. — Audrey Niffenegger

I pretty much grew up when punk was big in the UK. The Sex Pistols were heroes for me. I used to run around like Johnny Rotten. I had a jacket like his. — Gavin Rossdale

I think there is some truth to the fact that yeah, okay, cool, obviously the more mainstream kind of easier-to-grasp-onto dance music has become popular, but that holds true with almost any genre. It wasn't like the Sex Pistols hit the radio. It was poppier versions of that is what hit. It's never, like, the true core stuff. — Kaskade

I might do a solo album, maybe do covers, or do an acoustic thing. No Sex Pistols tours, nothing! — Steve Jones

I wasn't planning on being a guitar player; I was going to be a singer. And I was for a little bit in the Sex Pistols - that is, until we got John Lydon. And then I realized I wasn't really suited as a front guy. — Steve Jones

Just as Bowie, Zeppelin, etc., became rock stars by remaking themselves in the image of the California girls, the Go-Gos became rock stars by pretending to be the Buzzcocks and the Sex Pistols. Jane Wiedlin always said her biggest influence was growing up in L.A. as a Bowie girl. — Rob Sheffield

There was an intelligence about him (Joe Strummer) that allowed his band to change and evolve, just as Johnny Rotten and the Sex Pistols were disappearing up their own bondage trousers. And there was a generosity about Strummer, too, a warmth and humanity about the guy. He was a brilliant musician, a beautiful man, and a charismatic artist. There is a part of me that bitterly resents the fact that the Clash never replaced the Rolling Stones in rock music's hall of heroes. But the Clash were not about milking if for a lifetime ... I thought they were the greatest band I had ever seen. And, half a lifetime on, in a large part of my soul, I still do ... They changed lives. They certainly changed mine. Because they made me believe that, with passion and commitment and a bit of fire in your belly, you could be exactly the person you wanted to be. — Tony Parsons

When punk began to be a genre, people were going to go out and try to mine it. Some of the better groups, like the Ramones and the Sex Pistols, were very artificial. — Iggy Pop

People are like, 'Well, she doesn't know the Sex Pistols.' Why would I know that stuff? Look how young I am. That stuff's old, right? — Avril Lavigne

I've tried to stay true, in my own fashion, to the ideas of The Sex Pistols, even while I was working with bands like Duran Duran or the Stones, whoever it might be. The thing that was attractive to me personally about videos in the beginning was that it was uncharted territory, and in a sense the record companies didn't know what they were doing. — Julien Temple

Television sounded really different than the Ramones sounded really different than us sounded really different than Blondie sounded really different than the Sex Pistols. — David Byrne

Before the Sex Pistols, music was so bloody serious, all run by university graduates. It was all head music devoid of any real intellectualism. There was no deep though in it, merely images pertaining to something mystical, too stupid and absolutely devoid of reality. How on earth were we supposed to relate to that music when we lived in council flats? We had no money, no job, no nothing. So the Pistols projected that anger, that rock-bottom working-class hate. — John Lydon

My very first gig was with the Sex Pistols, and it was also our first-ever gig. It was a very short set, and it was at Saint Martins College of Art in 1975. We were opening up for a band called Bazooka Joe, and their bass player at the time was Adam Ant, who went on to form Adam and the Ants. — Steve Jones

We're Sex Pistols, we ain't fake. — John Lydon

I started going to Madame Louise's, the lesbian club where all the punk bands used to go - the Sex Pistols, the Clash. I remember seeing Billy Idol walk in there; he was gorgeous. — Boy George

I love the Sex Pistols. I'm a big Beach Boys fan and a huge Zeppelin and Queen fan. — Bruno Mars

I always felt there was kind of a millennial aspect to The Sex Pistols. — Julien Temple

When I was in the Sex Pistols, I listened to Boston. But I couldn't tell anybody, you know. I'd get lynched. — Steve Jones

What's the deal with the bossman?" Urian asked him.
Alexion shrugged. "I don't know. He came in last night with a book, went to his room to read, I suppose, and then he came out here this morning and has been playing ... those songs ever since."
Those songs were ballads, which Acheron never played. God-smack, Sex Pistols, TSOL, Judas Priest, but not ...
"Is that ... " Urian physically cringed before he spat out the name, "Julio Iglesias?"
"Enrique."
Urian grimaced in horror. "I didn't even know he knew any mellow shit. Dear gods ... is he ill?"
"I don't know. In nine thousand years, I've never seen him like this before."
Urian shuddered. "I'm beginning to get scared. This has to be a sign of the Apocalypse. If he breaks out into Air Supply, I say we sneeak up on him, drag him outside and beat the holy shit out of him. — Sherrilyn Kenyon

I did a load of medicine cabinets a long time ago and I named them after Sex Pistols songs. I suppose I must be getting old if I'm naming work after Philip Larkin poems. — Damien Hirst

It seems like the powers that be are really trying to separate everything and really divide the genres and divide the trends. If you're metal and you don't sound like Slayer would sound now, then you're not metal. If you're punk rock and you don't sound like and preach about what The Sex Pistols would have preached about back in the day, then you're not really punk rock. — Cristian Machado

I've always said, I thought the Sex Pistols was more Music Hall than anything else - because I think that really, more truths are said in humour than any other form. — John Lydon

I'm tired of Glen Matlock saying he was the songwriter for the Sex Pistols. I co-wrote as many songs ... but I don't go shouting about it. — Steve Jones

The only thing that made the music different was that we were taking lyrics to places they had never been before. The thing that makes art interesting is when an artist has incredible pain or incredible rage. The New York bands were much more into their pain, while the English bands were much more into their rage. The Sex Pistols' songs were written out of anger, wheras Johnny was writing songs because he was brokenhearted over Sable... — Legs McNeil

I never intended for the Sex Pistols to be immeasurably successful. — Malcolm McLaren

When I was four, I think I just wanted to make noise. When I was about 10 years old I was given five CDs for my birthday: Pink Floyd's Dark side of the Moon, the Sex Pistols, Prodigy, Jimi Hendrix, and I can't remember the fifth one, but really different kinds of music. That's when I started to grasp it and enjoy it, listening to it. Then I started being in bands at school. — Eliot Paulina Sumner

I always think the Sex Pistols and the Ramones as very, very important because they stripped things down. — Jim Jarmusch

I think there were early critics who wanted us to change the world because the Sex Pistols failed. — Michael Stipe

No one has actually gone further than The Sex Pistols, I don't think, in that cultural music arena. They still challenge people. — Julien Temple

Punk-rock records came out and you bought whatever you could find. But Devo didn't happen for another three years. Sex Pistols didn't tour the States until '78. At that time, for me, it was really about CBGB, Patti Smith, Talking Heads, the Ramones, and Television. — Michael Stipe

Vivienne Westwood, The Sex Pistols, Seven Stars, coffee with milk and strawberry cake. And Ren flowers.
Nana's favorite things never change.
It was so cool for someone like me who keeps on changing their mind. — Ai Yazawa

In his suicide note, Kurt Cobain wrote, "It's better to burn out than to fade away." He was quoting a Neil Young song about Johnny Rotten of the Sex Pistols. When I was twenty-four, I interviewed John Lennon. I asked him about this sentiment, one that pervades rock and roll. He took strong, outraged exception to it. "It's better to fade away like an old soldier than to burn out, " he said. "I worship people who survive. I'll take the living and the healthy. — David Sheff

There was a thing during those times in the '80s where it was like Sex Pistols then Nirvana and nothing in between. — Mike Watt

Nothing contemporary is as extreme or as strongly stated as what the Sex Pistols were able to do in their time. — Julien Temple

I still have my "Anarchy in the UK" 7" [ Sex Pistols single]. I'm sure it gave us a context to think about as well as a kind of kick in the ass. But we had all been playing for years at that point. — David First

[Replying to the question of the presenter: "where did the name "Sex Pistols" come from, who thought this name up?"] Some animal. I can't remember. It doesn't matter. It's history. — John Lydon