Steve Porcaro Quotes

A lot of kids bought guitars and started playing rock'n'roll because of us.

After the Ed Sullivan Show, Feb. 9, 1964, at approx. 8:04pm [laughs], after that moment every album, every guitar, evey set of drums that was ever sold ... 10% should have gone right into their pocket!

From 1962 to 1965, the guitar became this icon of youth culture, thanks mostly to the Beatles.

Like all teenagers in the early '60s, I put down my hockey stick when the Beatles got big and picked up a guitar. We all thought we'd be rock stars. Then I got into comedy, but I'd always find a way to use my guitar, such as writing songs and doing musical parodies.

I don't care what anybody says about Ringo. I cut my rock-n-roll teeth listening to him.

My dad has been playing guitar basically all his life. He's sort of who got me into rock music.

There's so many influential albums my parents would put on. Like the first album I ever heard was 'Help!' by the Beatles and from there I just loved rock music.

My dad always played a lot of music, so I heard him playing all the time, and then I decided that I wanted to learn to play guitar, so I got an acoustic and started taking lessons. I wanted to be able to shred like Yngwie Malmsteen.

I think between The Beach Boys, The Beatles, The Rolling Stones and innumerable acts after that... rock music became a huge economic force.

My family was musical on both sides. My father's family had a famous flautist and a classical pianist. My mother won a contest to be Shirley Temple's double - she was the diva of the family. At 8, I learned how to play guitar. I used to play songs from the '20s, '30s and '40s in the kitchen for my grandmother.

I never went to rock concerts when I was a kid. I didn't see any rock & roll bands. I had posters on my wall. I had Beatles records.

I'd love to be in Paul McCartney's shoes for a day. I'd love to pick up a guitar and write songs like he does. Or to experience what it might have been like to be a Beatle for a day.

In the '90s, guitar solos were dead.

When I get 13 or 14 years old, I get crazy with rock music, like, like, deeply crazy. And one of my favorite bands at that moment was, for example, like - bands like Metallica or Led Zeppelin, Black Sabbath, Pink Floyd and Santana, you know? And then I start to play metal, actually, when I was - at the age of 15.

You know, you've got to be careful with how you educate your kids in rock'n'roll fashion.

Richard Lloyd of Television is one of my favorite guitarists. His mentor was Jimi Hendrix when he was just 14. Jimi was always pounding everything he knew into that kid.

I just liked music, and I really liked rock guitar. I didn't think I was going to be a rock guitar player, because I was a girl. I would've been too shy to play with guys.

Everything I know, I stole directly from Ace Frehley, Angus Young, and Keith Richards. That's how you learn.

Music's been a huge passion of mine since I was really young. I started playing guitar when I was thirteen.

I got into rock music at thirteen, listening to Van Halen, learned how to play the electric guitar.

I just sort of grew up with music always in the background like a soundtrack. And it really hit me hard when The Beatles came along, like so many people. That got me started digging back further to Chuck Berry.

One of the key guitars in my career has been an early-Seventies Fender Telecaster Deluxe that I had before Sonic Youth started and that I played pretty much throughout Sonic Youth.

I was born and raised in Germany, so I was classically trained. Classical has been deep in me from a totally early age. Then, as a teenager, I picked up the guitar and was really into rock music.

My fourth birthday, I was given a violin, and my fifth birthday, a guitar. I didn't start to play until I saw Hendrix on TV. They showed him setting his guitar on fire and burning it for the Monterey Pop Festival.

I was interested in music since I was 14 years old. What really got me started was the first Led Zeppelin album... absolutely.