Lee Ranaldo Quotes

My favorite moment of the whole thing was when John Belushi suggested that I get a hold of all the blues records I could so I could research the music.

I think there are just a million interviews in anthologies with famous musicians that are about the music, and they're really boring to read.

I'm always very careful to make the distinction between music criticism and music journalism. A lot of people don't. But criticism doesn't require reporting. You can write criticism at home in your underwear. On the other hand, journalism takes legwork - you have to get out there and see things and talk to people.

I'm not technically adept at music, but I'd love to be part of a discussion of where progressive rock ends and country music begins.

I don't like music docs, usually. There's nothing to really say. What can you say about music? Normally, you can't say too much. There are a few really good ones, but the majorities are boring, I think.

It is better to make a piece of music than to perform one, better to perform one than to listen to one, better to listen to one than to misuse it as a means of distraction, entertainment, or acquisition of 'culture.'

The press will naturally come and go as it has done with all artists, from David Bowie to Neil Young to U2.

The back story of a songwriter isn't important to me - I don't listen to music needing to know who the guy is.

I couldn't imagine what it's like to be a journalist talking about music. You're left with empty descriptions; you probably have to make up a sort of weird cocktail of band influences and references to other music to get your point across.

I'm very much interested in music specifically and wanted to make a film about it, but not in an atmosphere of censorship.

I'm going to try and make you take the Beatles and Eric Clapton as seriously as the Berlin Philharmonic and Simon Rattle.

Here's what I think about music and journalism: The most important thing is to just press play.

I only read the very best music books. Donald Fagan's memoir 'Eminent Hipsters' is great. Bob Dylan's memoir 'Chronicles' and Patty Smith's 'Just Kids' are both incredible.

If rock criticism is to be a political calling, which has always been my angle, that's obviously not because it's a fountainhead of protest songs.

I don't really think reviewing music is something you're going to get famous doing overnight.

One of my great frustrations for 35 years at the paper was the fact I couldn't play a record for the reader when I was writing about an artist. How can you describe the beauty of Emmylou Harris' voice without hearing it, the sensual lilt of a Duane Allman guitar solo without actually hearing it, or the growl of Johnny Rotten without hearing it?

And my career, the things that have happened have happened because of my music education background.

'None of Your Business.' It's the only Salt-N-Pepa song that I regret.

I wrote the music column in my high school newspaper.

Studying music in a conservatory would be stifling for me, although I respect people who can do it. And by no means am I an expert at notating music or music theory - that's not really my world.

My mother Elizabeth Ivey Brubeck was a pianist who studied with Dame Myra Hess and Tobias Matthey. As a child in California I used to listen to her play Chopin.

I am a lover of all sorts of different music. I love blues and every piece of music that I have listened to has become an influence.

I listen to archival and historic recordings. I love watching singers. I learned a lot from watching videos.

I've been playing piano my whole life, but I'd never tried to understand how compositions are made, really. Try to imagine if you'd loved paintings your whole life but had never painted one. My aspiration now is just to understand.

My reading is always about musical biographies. I have an innate interest and passion for that.