Tom Petty Quotes

When I was a reporter in Bristol, which I was between the years 1954 and 1960, the newspaper would get tickets for whoever showed up to play a gig at the big hall down the road, so I saw some wonderful people. The Everly Brothers, for example.

I had been an eyewitness to a truly historic moment in American pop culture.

The first band I saw were Mike Sheridan and The Nightriders, in their brown mohair suits, in 1966.

New York City has more rock history in its 305 square miles than most of America combined.

There is an intimacy about the Opry Theater that gives an entertainer a special charge.

Music is probably the only real magic I have encountered in my life. There's not some trick involved with it. It's pure and it's real. It moves, it heals, it communicates and does all these incredible things.

There's nothing like walking out and watching the people get turned on. Nothing in the world could replace it.

There has to be an interaction of musicians on stage. Otherwise I feel too alone up there. When performing is really good, when it really works, maybe once every 15 shows, it's very special, and you realize that's why you do it.

Surely every band wants to be a pivotal point in history.

To be in one band that changed the world musically is pretty good, but to be in two bands that changed the world musically, that's amazing.

It's so funny: whenever there's a new technology introduced, there's always this fear it's going to end entertainment as we know it. When records came around, they were going to be the end of live music. Nobody would ever want to go see live music again.

I've seen Coldplay live a couple of times, and you feel like you just got rained over with glorious, glowing love. That's a good feeling to leave people with.

When the Beatles were on 'Ed Sullivan,' life went from black and white to color like in 'The Wizard of Oz' - and the irony I'm in the band Toto is not lost on me.

I would rather go back to when I started doing music in Ireland and it was all live. I mean you just don't mime.

I definitely enjoy the kind of magic that happens being on stage with a group when everything's working. The vibe when that's happening gets even better if the audience is involved and you can feel that interaction. That's something you don't get with your headphones on in a studio; it's much different.

When I'm on stage, it's like a different world ... me connecting with the audience. It's a surreal experience.

The Beatles are a passing phase, symptoms of the confusion about us.

So we come together before you on this day, March 30th, 2015, with one voice in unity in the hopes that today will be another one of those moments in time, a moment that will forever change the course of music history.

A musician's biography is written wherever he performs; everybody hears what he is playing.

I'm a big fan of the young 1950s Elvis when he would just go onstage and control the whole environment.

You can't go on stage and live - it's false all the way. I can't stand the premise of going out in jeans and a guitar and looking as real as you can in front of 18,000 people. I mean, it's not normal!

For better or for worse, I think my approach to jazz is very traditional, in one sense, but is [also] very out of fashion today. It's about the musicians, and it's about that magic that happens in the moment.

When [the magician] clicks his fingers and cards change to the four aces, we know we have experienced sleight of hand. Real magic would not be quite that quick and easy. Real magic would take investment. Real magic would draw you in, and make you nervous.

The most incredible thing about playing the songs live for people - looking out to the crowd and seeing the different reactions and the different heart-strings and the things that people are relating to that mean something to them, that's crazy.

When everything is together - the band, me, the audience, it's boss! It's just like magic.