Joan Jett Quotes

I like to get within handshaking distance of the crowd. If it happens, they know it, we know it, and that's all we came here for.

It's nice to be in a smaller room. I like the big arenas as well, but at my core, I'm a live performer, so it's nice to be able to feel the warmth of everybody in the room.

Only in the theatre was it possible to see the performers and to be warmed by their personal charm, to respond to their efforts and to feel their response to the applause and appreciative laughter of the audience. It had an intimate quality; audience and actors conspired to make a little oasis of happiness and mirth within the walls of the theatre. Try as we will, we cannot be intimate with a shadow on a screen, nor a voice from a box.

I love little theatres because it's very intimate, and you can have a very easy rapport with the audience. Everyone's in the same room.

I write things in my house, and hopefully there's a reader out there who enjoys it and has an experience with it, but that's very different than a performer on stage, where there's an immediate dance with the audience. It's incredibly powerful.

I like doing theaters. I like being up close and personal with the fans. It's really cool.

But I always communicate with the audience. I never pretend like I'm just in my bedroom making a track. The whole point of doing a gig is, like, a feedback thing between you and the audience.

In those days a concert was a personal experience. I wanted to be as close as possible to the audience, and of course big stadiums didn't enable you to do that. It wasn't my style.

You've got a song you're singing from your gut, you want that audience to feel it in their gut. And you've got to make them think that you're one of them sitting out there with them too. They've got to be able to relate to what you're doing.

Intimacy comes from being yourself on the stage and making the audience feel, without trying, that you're sittin' down there with 'em, playing, and that can happen in a big hall, if you have a good audience that want to listen.

When you're literally staring at the person right in front of you, you're connecting with them on a personal level. I even jump into the crowd sometimes and perform with them, sing into the mic with them and share the experience with them.

Stand-up and sketch and improv - that's the most direct contact you can have with somebody, making them laugh. I like that. I like the intimacy.

That connectivity with the audience that I get to enjoy, that's my church. It's not one of ego or anything like, 'I'm on the stage and the lights.' It's just this connectivity, and it's always been that way for me.

You can't manufacture the feeling of being in a small crowd and connecting on every single level to the very last person in the very last row in the back. I think when you evolve into a headlining act and things get bigger, the intimacy and some of that energy gets lost a little bit.

I love performing live and engaging with my fans on-ground.

There is nothing like a live performance. You can look at things on television, and you can look at things on YouTube, but when you get in a room full of people and you say one joke, and everyone's laughing at the same thing, it's a really great experience.

I grew up on the side of the stage. I never had a fear of an audience. I never felt like they were separated from us. We were all in the living room, and it happens to be a big living room. I continue to operate on that assumption.

I love performing, and connecting with an audience never gets old for me.

I used to be a big arena person. I thought more people equaled more intensity, but smaller places are a lot more intimate, I feel more connected with the audience.

It's so special to meet people after the show, getting that connection during the actual concert. It creates a stronger bond.

I prefer to play in smaller venues because I like the intimacy, the connection with the audience.

It's an honour when your audience sings along, more than they listen to you at a live gig.

When you play a show and you see people singing your lyrics back to, you feel as if they do know you.

When you play a smaller, more intimate venue, you can have real conversations with your audience, take risks, and stay current. You can also change the set list, on how the day feels or how the audience reacts. When you do arena shows, every arena looks and feels the same. You can't see who is in the room.

The most important part about playing shows and touring, is connecting with fans. At the end of the day it's not really a band and fans, we're all just human beings.