Notable Quotable Quotes From Some Of Rocknroll's Finest Characters

[Lefty Wilbury]

http://www.daveling.co.uk/quotes.htm



NOTABLE QUOTABLE QUOTES FROM SOME OF ROCKNROLL'S FINEST CHARACTERS
(and Blaze Bayley)


“If being a performer is stumbling around on stage, then I guess he’s a performer.
His character has become a characterization of himself, so people go to see if he’ll fall off the stage,
or how many buckets of water he can throw. What’s that got to do with music?”
Ronnie James Dio on Ozzy Osbourne

“The secret of our success is pork scratchings in the trousers. It makes you jump about a lot onstage.”
Lemmy of Motörhead

"I'm cheerful because it's my wedding anniversary today. I've been married to Cindy for 15 years.
I've got bluebirds flying out of my rear."
Whitesnake's ever-ludicrous bird fancier David Coverdale

“Lady Diana… what a fox. I’d drag my dick through a mile of broken glass just to jerk off in her shadow.”
Ted Nugent, Hammersmith Odeon, February 1984

“As you tried to preface that question I thought, ‘God, that’s so preposterous’. And yet I understand why you ask.
But I find it hysterical, because I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been in bed with a woman who’d say,
‘My boyfriend told me you were gay’.”
Kiss’ Paul Stanley addresses longstanding rumours of homosexuality

“I would rather have my testicles eaten by Hannibal Lecter than tour with Mötley Crüe again.”
Dave Mustaine, Megadeth

"Mötley Crüe's 'Dr Feelgood' and 'Girls Girls Girls' are great songs, but listen to
their greatest hits - there's less quality songwriting there than our debut album."
Frankie Poullain, later quite rightly sacked by The Darkness

“Ever since my first album with Wolfsbane, he’s slagged me off in vicious, snide and personal ways.
He hates the fact that I’m still making music. He hates the fact he can’t kill my career in metal.
He hates me because I’m still alive. I don’t hate Dave Ling. I just think he’s a crap journalist.”
Blaze Bayley, so clearly unruffled by my contribution to his career that he wrote a song about me.
No, I’ve not heard it either…

“Rock journalism is people who can’t write interviewing people who can’t talk for people who can’t read.”
Frank Zappa

“By the time we finish this song, all you women will have so much cream in your jeans
you’ll think you’ve got a fucking trifle down there.”
Rocky Shades, now in a Blues Band tribute act, then of Wrathchild, introduces ‘Cock Rock Shock’
at the Hammersmith Clarendon in November 1982

“I always figured that everyone had a bush. It wasn’t specifically female. We all come from bush.”
Gavin Rossdale on the origins of his former band’s name

“We are modern day cowboys. We ride into town, put on a show, take the money, hit the bar,
take the ladies, and we’re gone.”
Bon Jovi’s Richie Sambora, speaking in 1987

“Are any of you guys into dead-fucks? You know what I like best about those little ladies that live six feet underground?
Every time I eat them out, I can feel the maggots crunching in my teeth.”
Slayer’s Tom Araya introduces the track ‘Necrophiliac’, Manchester Apollo, 1987

“A reporter in Helsinki recently told me, ‘Jon, I listened to your songs all the way through the 1970s
and I didn’t understand one word’. I told him I didn’t either.”
Jon Anderson of Yes

“Yes is almost like a beached whale. If it’s pushed into the water it swims quite well,
but it’s hard to get it into the water.”
Ex-Yes guitarist Trevor Rabin

“In the 1970s I looked like a walking tumbleweed.
It wasn’t until I chopped off all my hair that I started looking halfway human.”
Neal Schon, Journey

“We had a summer tour being booked with Queensrÿche, but they backed out and fucked us over.
Maybe they realised that having to play after us would make their fans realise how much they suck now.”
Dream Theater’s Mike Portnoy

“Fuck Dave Grohl. Let him get up there and play ‘Mr Crowley’, he can’t do it.
This guy is writing songs for Ozzy just because he played drums for fucking Shitvana.”
Zakk Wylde in a rage

“When Wendy O. Williams jumped you, you stayed jumped.”
Motörhead’s Lemmy

“If anybody out there thinks that they can play this lick, then come up onto this stage and I’ll suck their dick right here.
It ain’t gonna fuckin’ happen, baby….”
Ted Nugent introduces ‘Stranglehold’ at the House Of Blues in New Orleans, July 2001

“I respect anyone’s lifestyle, providing it doesn’t involve minors. And by that I mean children.
Miners? Great – whatever floats your boat.”
Paul Stanley, Kiss

“We’re at the pinnacle of our decline.”
The Who’s Roger Daltrey, in late 2005

“I had a couple of drinks. I started in 1970 and finished in 1985. It was a very big drink.”
Alice Cooper

“A reunion with Iron Maiden would swamp what both parties have achieved since we split up.
Maybe it would be fun to do a couple of gigs one day, but it’s not something that’s likely to happen, or that either of us needs.”
The still solo Bruce Dickinson, 1998

“When I was doing cocaine regularly I would say it was very much out of boredom -
plus the fact that I was addicted.”
UFO’s Pete Way

"There's very little femininity in what Metallica do. Their gigs are like big wank sessions.
All these virgin little boys, praying to this big willy.”
The Cult’s Ian Astbury, in 1991

"If you want to find Nikki Sixx when he’s not onstage, look for him on the streets, hanging with the kids,
sharing a beer and a sandwich. That’s where I'll be, man… on the streets where I belong."
Nikki Sixx, Mötley Crüe, speaking in 1988

“I’ve never been a dictator. I’m a breath of fresh air to work with, as a matter of fact.”
David Coverdale introducing yet another new Whitesnake line-up in 1982

“He’s an intelligent, well-read guy. But somehow he can’t connect the dots.”
Edward Van Halen on David Lee Roth

“We want to be the loudest band in the world. We’ve already had people throwing up at gigs,
so it won’t be long before we achieve that ambition.”
Biff Byford in the early days of Saxon

“If I thought too much about how influential I’ve been, I’d become more of a turd than I already am.”
Iggy Pop

“Even as age humbles me it feeds my arrogance. There’s still nothing that interests me as much as myself.”
Pete Townshend, The Who

“I hope I die before I turn into Pete Townshend.”
Nirvana’s Kurt Cobain, who thankfully achieved his goal

“The reason I started with prostitutes was solely to work on my negotiating skills. Once I mastered negotiating
with naked women, dealing with Interscope Records was a piece of cake.”
Rivers Cuomo of Weezer

“In rock music, you’re nothing until you’ve slept with Winona [Ryder] and had a feud with me.”
Courtney Love

“I’m a romantic realist. I love basking in the spotlight as much as anyone else, but it’s not real.
The only reason I insist on a million lights on me when I’m onstage is to disguise my fucking acne.”
Whitesnake’s David Coverdale

“We’re doing what we’ve always wanted to do. I mean, if I were a dustman, which I used to be,
and you asked me what I wanted to be in life, I’d say a rock star. And here I am.”
Biff Byford, Saxon, 1981

“Whaddya mean minor?!”
David Lee Roth when asked why he behaves like a minor deity

“Nobody can out-party The Nuge. People can get downwind of last week’s laundry that I just fondled momentarily,
and it will get you higher than any chemical known to man.”
The teetotal, drug-free Ted Nugent

“Throughout the history of rock, every band has sold themselves on their sexuality. With the exception of Marillion.”
That group’s singer, Steve Hogarth

“When I first met him, he couldn’t even speak English. It was all, ‘fuck’, ‘****’, ‘piss’, ‘shit’.
I introduced him to a whole new side of life. I gave him a dictionary.”
Angus Young of AC/DC on the late Bon Scott

“Ritchie Blackmore was a huge early influence on me, but after that I had to find my own way.”
Yngwie Malmsteen

“Everybody in this band categorically believes that Rob Halford should never sing with us again.
He doesn’t deserve it. ‘Ripper’ is the one who deserves to be up there.”
KK Downing of Judas Priest, July 2001

“Hello – I’m taking over. Before I join your band I want it clear that I’m taking over now. Here – my jacket – take and hang up.”
Steven Tyler recalls Michael Schenker’s audition for Aerosmith

“To me, there were a few moments of brilliance and 60-70 per cent shit.”
Francis Rossi’s controversial view on the early Status Quo albums

“At the end of the day, it was [a case of] better the devil you know.”
Steve Harris on Bruce Dickinson’s return to Iron Maiden

“The last time I played Hammersmith Odeon, I looked out in the front row and thought the pig season had opened.”
Ted Nugent on British women

“At the end, Tony Banks raised his glass. I thought he was going to toast us, but he said,
‘Well, we managed to sack the lot of you’. That’s Tony, true to form.”
Steve Hackett on the Genesis reunion dinner

“I discovered that I scream the same way whether I’m about to be devoured by a Great White
or if a piece of seaweed touches my foot.”
W Axl Rose, Guns N’ Roses

“I got my instructions from an angel I call Metatron. He said, ‘I will help you if you help me solder back molecules with the light’.
My instructions were mainly to be patient, gracious and grateful and I would be connected to the frequency of radio.”
Carlos Santana on the, er, supernatural success of his ‘Supernatural’ album

“When Hawkwind fired me, I came home and fucked all their old ladies. Not the ugly ones, of course. But at least four.”
Lemmy, Motörhead

“Du-u-u-u-u-d-d-d-des! I’ve got a ten-inch dick!”
The first words with which Sebastian Bach allegedly addressed his new Skid Row band-mates

“I’ll never forgive Ken Hensley for all the skulduggery. He’s become a born-again Christian… what bollocks. He did evil things.”
Uriah Heep drummer Lee Kerslake berates ex-keyboard player

“Fuck David Ellefson. He’s been a professional ass-licker for his whole career.”
Megadeth’s Dave Mustaine, on the band’s former bassist/co-founder

“He just didn’t turn up at rehearsals one day. I haven’t seen him since.”
Fastway’s ‘Fast’ Eddie Clarke, speaking in 1983 about Pete Way’s departure

“The album’s bass solo describes Achilles after he has killed Hector – brutally and without mercy, I might add,
which is a wonderful thing – cutting holes in his ankles, lacing leather straps through them and hitching him to his chariot.”
Joey DeMaio of Manowar

“Jay Jay French accused me of calling every magazine in the world and telling them to print pictures of me, not the band.
I looked at him in disbelief.”
Twisted Sister’s Dee Snider

“At that famous Liverpool Empire show [in 1976], I couldn’t even stand. I was making farmyard noises.
I wasn’t even happy in my own skin.”
Glenn Hughes on the demise of Deep Purple

“I was in the studio playing the solo at the end of ‘Don’t Stop Believing’, trying to bebop and jazz it a little.
Kevin [Elson, producer] said, ‘Just play the simplest thing you can think of’.
Begrudgingly I played something I thought was so stupid they’d fucking hate it, but everyone said, ‘That’s terrific’.
I fucked myself because it was something I’d hate to listen to for the rest of my career.”
Journey’s Neal Schon on one of the most revered melodic rock guitar solos ever

“If you look at any bands of note, you’ll see that there’s always been a one-two punch; Jagger and Richards with the Stones,
Lennon and McCartney in the Beatles and Page and Plant with Led Zeppelin.”
Blackie Lawless of W.A.S.P. on his relationship with Chris Holmes – in the days when they still spoke

“I grew up like my mom, Sandy Holmes. She’s a mean motherfucking woman.”
The aforementioned Chris Holmes

“Secretly, I wanted to look like Jimi Hendrix, but I could never quite pull it off.”
Bryan Ferry, Roxy Music

“We’re as much a punk band as anything.”
Fish, whilst still a member of Marillion

 

[Lefty Wilbury]

“I love trains. In fact, Pete Way’s got a Hornby train set, a double O gauge. He often takes it on tour
and sets it up in his bedroom. Lots of fun has been had with that.”
Phil Mogg decries UFO’s images as hellraisers

“I’m sick to death of people saying we’ve made 11 albums that sound exactly the same.
In fact, we’ve made 12 albums that sound exactly the same.”
AC/DC’s Angus Young

“I had no plans to join Black Sabbath. I went out for a few drinks with Tony Iommi and Geezer Butler,
and the next day I found out that I had agreed.”
Ian Gillan

“We’re better than Metallica. We’re better musicians, better players. Put it this way, they can try to walk onstage
after an Iron Maiden show if they want.”
Bruce Dickinson, Iron Maiden

“I don’t know how we made it this far without being rhythmic.”
Matthias Jabs of the Scorpions, talking in 1999

“After leaving Rainbow, it’s nice to be with a stable group.”
Cozy Powell, upon joining Whitesnake

“To me, Metallica is a shitty band. Their music is crap, and they won't be here in a few years.”
Mötley Crüe’s Nikki Sixx, April 1990

“One thing I’m proud of it that we never became housewives’ choice. You can’t iron to Iron Maiden.”
Dave Murray, Iron Maiden

“I don’t think that Yes have made a decent record since ‘Tormato’ [in 1978].
I’ve heard the stuff they're doing now [in the late 1990s] and it’s absolute excrement.”
Porcupine Tree’s Steven Wilson

“I’ve always liked a good polish. We were all blokes together, nobody was embarrassed.
There were some glistening knobs. Our mothers taught us all that wanking is bad – fuck off, it’s great!”
Francis Rossi on Status Quo’s communal masturbation sessions

“We’re wimps really, aren’t we? We could write the hardest rock song possible, yet as soon as we start to song we sound all girly.”
FM bassist Merv Goldsworthy

“It’s a bit like regretting you never fucked Kate Bush. There’s not much you can do about it now, is there?”
The late Phil Lynott, on Thin Lizzy’s inability to crack America

“You think it was easy to reunite this band? How tense was the first rehearsal?
Mark ‘Animal’ Mendoza was carrying a gun, I swear to God.”
Dee Snider of Twisted Sister

“I hope that everybody who takes drugs dies in their own fucking vomit.”
Ted Nugent

“I used to stand on my head onstage. When Uli Jon Roth was with us, we had a song called ‘Fly To The Rainbow’.
Sometimes I stood on my head for 15 minutes, depending on how long Uli’s solo lasted.”
Rudolf Schenker, the Scorpions

“I was seven years old when I lost my virginity and it was with a girl called Margaret, who was 12.
A policeman caught me, picked me up and smacked my arse.
And for two weeks afterwards I was frightened she was going to have a baby out of her bum.”
David Coverdale, Whitesnake

“Sammy Hagar may throw a party, I am the party.”
David Lee Roth

“Led Zeppelin progressed into this great band, yet as they progressed each individual had to progress.
It was the same with the Stones. And we intend on following in that tradition.”
Mötley Crüe’s Nikki Sixx

“It’s not the sort of thing you can put on in the background, then go and cook breakfast or have a wank.”
Metallica’s Lars Ulrich on the ‘…And Justice For All’ album

“Am I drinking today? Well, put it this way, I’m not not drinking.”
UFO’s Pete Way in Waysted mode

"I’ve been to rehab 15 times and I'm a recovering heroin addict.
Yet I’ve been to jail less than the President and Vice President of America!"
Megadeth's Dave Mustaine, during the Clinton years

“I could be pompous if I wanted to, because my full name is Yngwie J Af Malmsteen – the ‘Af’ part being
the German equivalent of the German ‘Von’. I’m from a noble family.”
Yngwie Malmsteen

“If people want to snigger at Manowar, it’s up to them. I’d rather have 10,000 warriors as fans than a million posers.”
Joey DeMaio, Manowar

“Joining a monastery? King Crimson does that to people.”
Robert Fripp

“I’d look stage right and [guitarist] Marc Ford was drooling on himself. It was sad. When he’s sober the guy can play his ass off.
But our friend and band-mate is so fucked up, he’s playing the wrong song.”
Rich Robinson, The Black Crowes

“I go more for spirit than actual beauty. There’s a few Russian gymnasts who’ve caught my fancy.”
David Lee Roth

“Our ‘The Razor’s Edge’ album features some of my highest notes since ‘Back In Black’.
God’s own ostrich on helium couldn’t do it any better.”
AC/DC’s Brian Johnson

“All those bands suck. Sometimes I think that if I’d had a crystal ball in 1985 when we were writing ‘I’m The Man’,
maybe we wouldn’t have done it. Limp Bizkit are the biggest band on the block right, and the worst.”
Scott Ian, Anthrax

“Some people have seen us as a joke act, but that’s just misinterpretation.
Just because we enjoy a joke doesn’t mean that we are a joke.”
Future Iron Maiden howler Blaze Bayley in his Wolfsbane days

“My life revolves around creamy stuff, I just can’t get enough of it. After a while it looks like I’ve just shit Johnny Winter.”
Ted Nugent

“I thought it was normal to inject drugs.”
UFO’s Pete Way

“When I left Status Quo they were one of the top ten bands in the world, now they’re just a laughing stock.
To me, there are better covers bands than the current line-up.”
Ex-bassist Alan Lancaster

“Mötley Crüe is like a fist. If anyone ever left, the band would break up.”
Nikki Sixx

“I honestly don’t think Vivian Campbell would know artistic freedom if it bit him on the private parts.”
David Coverdale, Whitesnake

“Ronnie James Dio is one of the vilest people in the music industry."
Vivian Campbell, Def Leppard

“I’ve tried to be a human being most of the time.”
Ronnie James Dio

“Do I have any theories on why our audience keeps coming back? Maybe it’s some kind of intense communal masochistic urge?”
Rush’s Geddy Lee

“Pink Floyd’s ‘The Division Bell’ album is just crap.”
Roger Waters

“I would chop off my left nut to have done the fuckin’ things I did in the past year.”
Sebastian Bach of Skid Row

“Why are we rock stars? Because we’re morons.”
Alice Cooper

“Not being the most attractive bod in the world, I don’t get surrounded by girls.
We don’t get a lot of people ripping off their clothes and throwing themselves at us.”
Magnum’s Tony Clarkin

“We like girls, we think they’re nice. You tend to get called an old bender if you sing about boys.”
FM drummer Pete Jupp

“We could do a 15-minute fart into a paper bag and some people would be more happy with that than a three-minute classic.”
Mark Kelly on Marillion’s eternal quantity versus quality dilemma

“Cozy Powell was a chocolate fanatic. He had a whole wardrobe full of chocolates. We would say to me,
‘Come on in and have Ovaltine or Horlicks. What do you want? Top shelf I’ve got KitKats, bottom shelf would be Mars bars,
middle shelf is Crunchies, chocolate cream. It was like a shop. He was like a little granny.”
Ritchie Blackmore

“We’re not the No.1 band – I don’t think we’d want to be – but White Lion will be staying at No.2,
or somewhere in that ballpark, for a long time.”
White Lion’s Mike Tramp

“They’re not a rock band, they’ve got no tunes, no chords or choruses. They’ve no idea how to behave onstage
and wear masks and red boiler suits. I don’t see any redeeming features, except they’re pretty good at disguises.
Maybe I’m too old to get it, but I don’t mind because they’re crap.”
Motörhead’s Lemmy on Slipknot

“I fuck everything that moves. And if it doesn’t move, we work something out.”
Gene Simmons of Kiss tells Playboy

“Earth females are appallingly unattractive.”
Oderus Urungus of Gwar

“Basically, I compose the music, I compose the melody lines, I write most of the lyrics.
Then I show them to the singer and he says, ‘Fucking great’, and doesn’t argue.”
Yngwie Malmsten on his band’s creative routine

“He’s an ignorant little sod, a starstruck little asshole.”
Graham Bonnet on Yngwie Malmsteen

“The claim that I once shat in Michael Schenker’s shoe and made him put it on is rubbish,
although I might have shut his head in the door and then slammed it.”
Phil Mogg of UFO

“I still meet people who say, ‘Don’t you remember me? I’m the guy who put the roof on your house’, and I go, ‘What house?’
I was drinking a bottle of whiskey, two or three bottles of wine and taking three grams of coke every day.”
Status Quo’s Rick Parfitt

“Man, I’ve done things that people would never believe, in limousines or telephone booths.
I’m notorious for doing it in ladies’ rooms, I’ve lived in those places. God, what a question.
It’s like asking a gourmet cook about the best meal he had in his life.”
Blackie Lawless of W.A.S.P. when asked the most peculiar place he had sex

“We make money, but not that much. Our drummer, Richard Chadwick, lives in a council house.”
Dave Brock of Hawkwind

“Does my publishing money cause problems with the rest of the band [who don’t write]?
Only if they crash their Escorts into my Porsche.”
Thunder’s Luke Morley

“When I arrived, Leppard had no guitar amps and they didn’t know where to get them.
They’d look at you like these little puppies, ‘Oooh, what are we going to do? We thought you’d have them.’”
Jim Steinman on his part in the ‘Hysteria’ sessions

“We want the sound that everyone else is trying to get away from.”
Joey De Maio, Manowar

“Jimi Hendrix mentioned to our conga player Michael Carabello that he was thinking of joining our band.
I said, ‘Great. I guess I’ll have to become a roadie.’”
Carlos Santana

“Instead of rock stars getting fan letters, we need to write letters to the garbage man
and the 24-hour pizza delivery man, those who stay up and make our lives pleasurable.”
Dan Reed, who obviously didn’t order anything from the same dodgy Chinese as me last night

“Face down in a pool of vomit.”
Motörhead’s Lemmy, when asked how he sleeps

“I’m still a mental infant.”
Megadeth's Dave Mustaine

“If there was a town, he painted it. And if he missed one, he went back.”
Angus Young on Bon Scott (again)

“Feminists are either lesbians or people who haven’t had good sex yet.”
Mandy Lion, World War III

“The old Van Halen, when I was in it, makes you wanna drink, dance and screw.
The new Van Halen encourages you to drink milk, drive a Nissan and have a relationship.”
David Lee Roth

“We bought him from his mother for 12 camels.”
Andy McCoy of Hanoi Rocks on the recruitment of drummer Razzle

“I always thought that if I died, I’d come back as a fire hydrant.”
Corey Glover, Living Colour

“The last band I went to see? Fucking hell, it was the Spice Girls. How embarrassing is that?”
Ex-Marillion singer Fish

“I fucked this chick in a coffin the other day. It was cool.”
Mötley Crüe’s Nikki Sixx

“When I meet a woman, I don’t think, ‘Gee, I wonder if she’s read the latest thesis by Stephen Hawking?’
I think, ‘Great tits’”
Three guesses… yeah, Gene Simmons again

“Anyone who says I’m a Blackmore clone is musically retarded. My guitar playing is as far away from his as anything can be.
I can stand up in court and prove with simple facts, I don’t play anything like him.”
Yngwie Malmsteen


If you know of an outstanding quote that you think belongs on this list
please send it to: [email protected] along with a reference to the source of the quote

 

[Dan]

“I discovered that I scream the same way whether I’m about to be devoured by a Great White
or if a piece of seaweed touches my foot.”
W Axl Rose, Guns N’ Roses

Kevin James said this, word for word, in a stand-up special on Comedy Central. I wonder if he ripped Axl off, or vice versa. Or of the journalist couldn't tell the difference between the two!