Quotes and Sayings about Punk
"There are a lot of bands who claim to be punk and they only play the music, they have no clue what it's all about. It's a lifestyle. It's not about popularity and all that crap."
- Billie Joe Armstrong
(Related: Music, Play, Popularity, Punk)
"Punk will never be dead to me. It's my life. I can never just drop this lifestyle. It embodies me."
- Billie Joe Armstrong
(Related: Life, Punk, Will)
"Punk is not just the sound, the music. Punk is a lifestyle."
- Billie Joe Armstrong
(Related: Music, Punk, Sound)
"A punk concert isn't fun without a pit."
- Billie Joe Armstrong
(Related: Fun, Punk)
"Punk has always been about doing things your own way. What it represents for me is ultimate freedom and a sense of individuality."
- Billie Joe Armstrong
(Related: Freedom, Individuality, Punk, Sense)
"I can play punk rock, and I love playing punk rock, but I was into every other style of music before I played punk rock."
- Travis Barker
(Related: Love, Music, Play, Punk, Style)
"I listened a little to punk when I was younger, but it was straight edge punk. It was nothing like what is going on now, like poppy punk."
- Travis Barker
(Related: Nothing, Now, Punk)
"A lot of people think that punk rock musicians don't know what they're doing."
- Travis Barker
(Related: People, Musicians, Punk)
"But there's actually a lot of punk bands out there that go out of the norm, use odd time signatures, or a lot of different tempo changes in a song."
- Travis Barker
(Related: Time, Punk, Song)
"Punk is not dead. Punk will only die when corporations can exploit and mass produce it."
- Jello Biafra
(Related: Corporations, Punk, Will)
"The jury had down right contempt for punk rock grass roots ethics."
- Jello Biafra
(Related: Contempt, Ethics, Jury, Punk, Right)
"The last true punk band to get a major label contract was The Dickies."
- Jello Biafra
(Related: Punk)
"It's funny how the hippies and the punks tried to get rid of the conservatives, but they always seem to get the upper hand in the end."
- Bjork
(Related: Funny, End, Hippies)
"Absolute 80's is three hours of mainstream 80's music. I also do New Wave Nation that is more cutting edge. It is more punk stuff from the 70's to the 90's."
- Nina Blackwood
(Related: Music, Nation, Punk)
"Were it not for the Clash, punk would have been just a sneer, a safety pin and a pair of bondage trousers."
- Billy Bragg
(Related: Punk, Safety)
"I was in a little punk band and we put out a few punk records that weren't very political, at all."
- Billy Bragg
(Related: Punk)
"By the time I was 19, punk had occurred. It had a completely different cultural dynamic to it which rejected everything and started again from the year zero."
- Billy Bragg
(Related: Time, Punk)
"Punk was defined by an attitude rather than a musical style."
- David Byrne
(Related: Attitude, Punk, Style)
"Country music is completely punk-rock. It's the original punk-rock."
- Neko Case
(Related: Music, Country, Country music, Punk)
"Punk is musical freedom. It's saying, doing and playing what you want. In Webster's terms, 'nirvana' means freedom from pain, suffering and the external world, and that's pretty close to my definition of Punk Rock."
- Kurt Cobain
(Related: Freedom, Pain, Pretty, Punk, Saying, Suffering, Want, World)
"I've always been spiritual but I've never had a proper context, and it took me awhile to find the proper context. It's hard to realize you can have any kind of relationship with God you want... and so I now have a punk rock relationship with God."
- Billy Corgan
(Related: God, Now, Punk, Spiritual, Want)
"Rap actually comes out of punk rock, not black music."
- Stanley Crouch
(Related: Music, Punk, Rap)
"I'm just starting to scratch the surface of what really makes me happy and it's taken me a while to admit that acting like a little child and being a jerk and a punk is fun."
- Leonardo DiCaprio
(Related: Acting, Being, Fun, Punk)
"I never understood why the metal heads in my school hated the punks."
- Trevor Dunn
(Related: School)
"Teachers didn't like me very much. They thought I was just this punk kid and they always wanted to kick me out."
- Clea Duvall
(Related: Thought, Punk, Teachers)
"I come from the home-grown punk ethic, where it doesn't matter if you can't play a note, it's how you communicate."
- Siobhan Fahey
(Related: Home, Play, Punk)
"I like the bad-boy types. Generally the guy I'm attracted to is the guy in the club with all the tattoos and nail polish. He's usually the lead singer in a punk band and plays guitar. But my serious boyfriends are relatively clean-cut, nice guys. So it's strange."
- Megan Fox
(Related: Guitar, Punk)
"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
(Related: Sex, Lesbian, Punk)
"There are several books out on punk history, but I haven't read any of them. I was there."
- Greg Ginn
(Related: History, Books, Punk)
"There's not much music I'll listen to if it doesn't have pretty heavy swing. Rhythm is so important. Punk rock would have more power and feeling if it had swing."
- Greg Ginn
(Related: Music, Power, Feeling, Pretty, Punk)
"Punk rock really came out of N.Y. as a philosophy before the groups were ever recorded. I had a kind-of intellectual interest in the idea of creating a new scene that could be a grassroots thing."
- Greg Ginn
(Related: Idea, Interest, Philosophy, Punk)
"I just think that playing bass, like punk rock bass with a pick, wasn't meant to be done for 25 years."
- Kim Gordon
(Related: Punk, Years)
"If it comes out sounding like Dixieland jazz or classical or punk or rock or even slightly metal, that's because that's where I'm going to find inspiration."
- Ben Harper
(Related: Inspiration, Jazz, Punk)
"I've always worn jewellery but for a time it went out of fashion. Like grungy and punk bands didn't wear jewellery because it was stupid."
- Tom Jones
(Related: Time, Fashion, Punk)
"Punk rock really influenced me, the basic metal bands, Zeppelin, Stones and Floyd, and Southern rock bands. I think I was pretty well-rounded."
- Al Jourgensen
(Related: Pretty, Punk)
"I didn't know who was on the team, but I saw every eye as I walked down the aisle. It looked like a thousand eyes were staring right at me saying, 'Who is this young punk?' I just kept my eyes straight ahead."
- Al Kaline
(Related: Eye, Eyes, Punk, Right, Saying)
"I created Punk for this day and age. Do you see Britney walking around wearing ties and singing punk? Hell no. That's what I do. I'm like a Sid Vicious for a new generation."
- Avril Lavigne
(Related: Age, Day, Hell, Punk, Singing, Walking)
"Then the early punk rock period with Television and the Ramones. That's what I loved- that's what I was listening to immediately prior to when I started to play."
- Arto Lindsay
(Related: Listening, Play, Punk, Television)
"The period right before punk rock where people like Lou Reed and Iggy Pop were really strong."
- Arto Lindsay
(Related: People, Punk, Right)
"I love my red hair. It makes me spunkier."
- Lindsay Lohan
(Related: Love, Hair)
"When punk rock came along, the one thing you were not supposed to be was musical."
- Nick Lowe
(Related: Punk)
"All those years we'd spent learning these chops, and all those gigs in Germany where you'd play all night, and along comes punk. It has nothing to do with that. A lot of people went out of business."
- Nick Lowe
(Related: Business, People, Germany, Learning, Night, Nothing, Play, Punk, Years)
"It's very cliched to go, 'You're not punk.' We don't care if we are, and we don't care if we aren't."
- Joel Madden
(Related: Care, Punk)
"Mozart was a punk, which people seem to forget. He was a naughty, naughty boy."
- Shirley Manson
(Related: People, Forget, Punk)
"It's all magic to me. Country to punk rock, all of it. Chopin to Kurt Cobain. But it always all comes back to punk for me, because that was the last time, punk rock or grunge rock, was the last time that passion ruled the airwaves."
- James Marsters
(Related: Time, Country, Magic, Passion, Punk)
"It's funny; we never had anything like credibility. Even though we all have some sort of punk-rock background, but so what? I really don't care about that. What's credibility anyway? Who has credibility?"
- Mark McGrath
(Related: Funny, Care, Credibility, Punk)
"The funniest thing happened in one of my first scenes. In the beginning Emma was really arrogant and punk and in every scene she would slam the door when she walked in or out."
- Dannii Minogue
(Related: Beginning, First, Punk)
"And I used to go the punk clubs such as a gay club in Poland Street that everyone would go to because it was the only place you could go to looking like that without getting beaten senseless."
- Gary Numan
(Related: Gay, Punk)
"I'd been a Bowie fan before punk and used to get no end of trouble. I was always getting knocked about and having to run up the street, getting chased by people. It was horrible."
- Gary Numan
(Related: People, End, Punk, Trouble)
"The new album is a childhood dream come true. Got to sing with Ronnie Spector, got to cover a bunch of songs that were influential in drawing a line between the punk form and original rock and roll."
- Jerry Only
(Related: Dream, Childhood, Punk, Songs)
"The problem is we moved to LA... The only way to be punk rock in L.A. is to be a Republican."
- Trey Parker
(Related: Punk, Republican)
"Nobody got Punk'd and he was still in his season for that show when we were filming. So the kids were very aware that it was filming and that was his show and they were very much on the lookout for that."
- Piper Perabo
(Related: Kids, Punk)
"By many peoples' standards, my playing is very primitive but by punk standards, I'm a virtuoso."
- Robert Quine
(Related: Punk)
"I got tired of the Ramones around the time I quit and I really got into rap. I thought it was the new punk rock. LL Cool J was my biggest idol."
- Dee Dee Ramone
(Related: Time, Thought, Punk, Rap)
"Style has always been very important to us. We grew up in the '70s. Music was glam rock, punk rock and a very stylish movement."
- Nick Rhodes
(Related: Music, Punk, Style)
"I think people are too hard on the Pistols. The Pistols started the whole punk thing and never saw much money."
- Gavin Rossdale
(Related: Money, People, Punk)
"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
(Related: Sex, Heroes, Pretty, Punk)
"My dad took me to all the best rock and punk shows when I was growing up and music has always been a part of my life. So I'm very interested in the music scene and I suppose that's why I've ended up going out with musicians. Dave Pirner is still one of my best friends."
- Winona Ryder
(Related: Dad, Music, Life, Friends, Growing up, Musicians, Punk)
"I'm thinking of remaking Psycho again. Doing a third remake. The idea this time is to really change it - we're talking about doing a Punk rocker setting."
- Gus Van Sant
(Related: Change, Time, Idea, Punk, Talking, Thinking)
"There is a great deal of cyberpunk that I admire, especially the work of William Gibson which I think is excellent. Somehow he speaks from his own heart and cyber punk is what comes out."
- Robert Sheckley
(Related: Work, Heart, Punk)
"The iconoclastic mode, that specific mode of language, there is an element of it that it is punk - that is confrontational. That's just a part of the language of jazz - at a certain point."
- Matthew Shipp
(Related: Jazz, Language, Punk)
"The first Decline I did was out of sheer love and appreciation for the music. In 1977, it was more about bands, because punk was a new form of music. It was groundbreaking and political."
- Penelope Spheeris
(Related: Love, Music, Appreciation, First, Punk)
"It's really hard to imagine there ever being the kind of impact there was when punk rock happened in the late 70's. I wish there would be one big change like that again, but I don't know if that'll ever happen."
- Penelope Spheeris
(Related: Change, Being, Punk)
"I love punk rock, but I also love metal."
- Penelope Spheeris
(Related: Love, Punk)
"I was once a student in a punk T-Shirt hooked on screwed-up scenarios. That's how I became the esteemed cultural figure that I am today."
- Bruce Sterling
(Related: Punk, Today)
"Even though we're not the most punk rock band, the way we've done things is pretty punk rock. Just kinda say it with a big middle finger to the record labels and do it ourselves."
- Brandon Thomas
(Related: Pretty, Punk)
"I just try not to subscribe to the ways of celebrity. I'm not a celebrity, I'm a working actor. A lot of the events - the parties and the premieres that people go to to get noticed - I'm just not into. I'll hang out with my friends, go see punk shows, read at home. At the same time, I have a production company, which is a lot of work."
- Milo Ventimiglia
(Related: Work, Home, Time, People, Actor, Celebrity, Company, Events, Friends, Production, Punk)
"Punk is not really a style of music. It was more like a state of mind."
- Mike Watt
(Related: Music, Mind, Punk, State, Style)
"I think punk rock, especially for me, was a big middle finger to this whole talent thing."
- Mike Watt
(Related: Talent, Punk)
"My son has followed fashion since he was a punk. He and I agree that fashion is about sex."
- Vivienne Westwood
(Related: Sex, Son, Fashion, Punk)
"I was the first person to have a punk rock hairstyle."
- Vivienne Westwood
(Related: First, Punk)
"When the punk thing came along and I heard my friends saying, I hate these people with the pins in their ears. I said, Thank God, something got their attention."
- Neil Young
(Related: God, People, Attention, Friends, Hate, Punk, Saying)