Jon Landau Quotes

Neil Young is my hero, and such a great example. You know what that guy has been doing for the past 40 years? Making music. That's what that guy does. Sometimes you pay attention, sometimes you don't. Sometimes he hands it to you, sometimes he keeps it to himself. He's a good man with a beautiful family and wonderful life.

Neil Young is the prime example, the grand goal, if you will. He's still shredding, and he never lost his credibility.

Elton John is a huge influence and an artist I've listened to since I was a little girl.

Probably more than anybody else, I loved Nat 'King' Cole as a performer - not only his singing but his piano playing. Whenever he had a new record come out, I'd get it and try to learn how he was playing. And he was one of the nicest people I'd ever met.

Her makeup, hair and general quirkiness overshadow the fact that Cyndi Lauper was one the most soulful chicks to come out of the '80s.

I would love for people to look at me as a great singer but also know exactly who I am, the way that we have loved and respected people like Gladys Knight and Patti LaBelle, having gone through the different stages of their lives with them. That's the type of history I want to have.

Not to be mean about it, but some great rock and rollers, like Bo Diddley and Chuck Berry, are pretty one-dimensional.

Steinberg is great. I should like to meet him.

Bob Dylan is great. I've been compared to him a lot. I think when people see a person on stage with a guitar they just think, 'Bob Dylan!'

People like Frank Zappa were amazing for us Brits.

Bowie's been a huge influence on me.

Now, I don't know how they judge all that, but if anybody in the world deserves to be in the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame, Ritchie Valens does.

When you think about rock at its origin, and you think of the Beatles and millions of kids screaming as loud as they can and running as fast as they can towards the Beatles, there's no one who is that kind of lightning rod, who commands that kind of power and has that kind of creative magma.

Ray Charles, in his own way, it's like at the beginning, Ray Charles changed American music, not once but twice.

We're trying to have the band create something beautiful that hopefully one day, 20 years from now, can be picked up by a kid and hopefully have the same effect that Neil Young had on me, or Led Zeppelin or Black Sabbath.

I hope my fans will grow with me. I want to be like Michael Jackson: 5-year-olds love his music, and 75-year-olds love his music.

I think everyone mentions Bob Dylan, but he's someone I just admire so much as a songwriter. I think people write songs, and then there's Bob Dylan songs. He's one step ahead of just everybody else.

When you make a great record, it's around forever.

I'm a huge Springsteen fan, and yet if either he or Bob Dylan had to be erased from the world's hard drive, I would save Bob Dylan's work for sure - he's the greater talent, and by leaps and bounds and skyscrapers and rocket blasts. But Bob Dylan is an alien to his public.

I was privileged to know the late, great Miss Etta James, and I did get a chance to spend some time with her and hang out with her.

I take my hat off to people like the Stones, but it's not for me. I couldn't do that. Jagger is brilliant and long may he rock. I couldn't make my career out of old songs; it would do my head in.

In my creative life, David Bowie is definitely an enormous influence on me, being one of rock's greatest shapeshifters.

Buddy Holly had something very different from the other great early rock n' roll stars, whether it was Chuck Berry, Elvis Presley, Little Richard, Bo Diddley. He came across as so ordinary, as such a nerd. You know, he was a big guy, and he carried a gun. He was anything but a nerd.

Prince is gone. But the music will go on.

I named my son after Randy Rhoads - Rhoads Morello.