Scott Ian Quotes

America is tough for rock music. Rock n' roll used to be the main music for the youth, and it's not so much anymore. It's hip-hop and stuff.

When Phil and I started out, everyone hated rock n' roll. The record companies didn't like it at all - felt it was an unnecessary evil. And the press: interviewers were always older than us, and they let you know they didn't like your music, they were just doing the interview because it was their job.

There's always people saying that rock is dead, rock is over. People are always out to kill rock and roll.

What did happen to rock music? I think there was a hip-hop takeover.

My roots in electronic music go from weird glitch music to now what's seen as pop music. Electronic music is pop music now.

Rock bands were never newsworthy. In the '60s and '70s, rock bands weren't in the newspapers because they weren't considered mainstream; they wouldn't sell papers.

Rock in the mainstream culture has lost a lot of its mojo.

When 5150 came out rock was king. Post Nirvana and Pearl Jam 1996 is a different story.

Dick Clark really didn't make rock 'n roll safe for America, as many people think.

So dance music is now pop music. So now, as a dance producer, what do I have to do? So I'm starting to do alien music, because pop is not pop anymore; we need to go alien to be independent.

My input for the first 16, 17 years of my life was AM radio, FM radio - pretty mainstream stuff. Rolling Stone was probably as edgy as it got.

You're surrounded by electronic music in New York. I mean New York is one of the few places in North America where electronic music is the prevalent form.

Dance music has pushed its way into the mainstream. Which is good for me.

I remember Mitch Miller saying every week, This rock and roll stuff will never last. But one doesn't like to bring that up to Mitch.

The music industry isn't converging toward dance music. Dance music is dance music. It's been around since disco - and way before disco. But there's different versions of dance music.

I have a feeling there were many, many successful rock duos that just didn't get attention. That's the fault of the rock press. They are always playing up controversy, scandal, aggravation, and irritation.

MTV ruined music for us.

Oddly, I think that a lot of the haters of EDM and DJs are actually within the world of electronic music.

Well, rock used to be the only game in town in terms of radio and what the kids listen to. Now I think there was a big hip-hop takeover, and pop music, it became mechanical and computer-y.

I think rock 'n' roll, in a way, has been dead for a long time.

In 1952, Muddy cut the song 'Rollin' Stone.' It was a nationwide success, and the song echoes down through rock n' roll history. Bob Dylan cut a tribute by the same name, an English band decided to call themselves the Rolling Stones, and the magazine that first embraced music as a serious cultural phenomenon was itself called 'Rolling Stone.'

The whole world has changed much since the '80's. In the united States, rap music and country music dominate radio and that certainly wasn't the case in the early '80's.

You can still make music that people love, but there won't be more innovation. I started listening to electronic music a long time ago. But mostly I listen to rap. I think rap is the most interesting.

The technology is good and it's bad. You know what you're dealing with out there musically, but my head stops at this electronic stuff. I don't quite know what I'm dealing with out there yet.

I think the hip hop world and the rock world still have a lot in common, but it certainly seems like things happen and break at a much faster pace in the hip hop world.