Jon Taffer Quotes

It's funny I'm talking to 'Rolling Stone' right now, because back then, it was like, 'Punk rock? Put it back. It's just a flash in the pan.'

When punk came along, I found my generation's music. I grew up listening to the Beatles and the Rolling Stones and Pink Floyd, 'cause that was what got played in the house. But when I first saw the Stranglers, I thought, 'This is it.'

We were watching bands like the Ramones and Blondie and other bands beginning to ignite.

The Germs' contribution to history sucks as far as I'm concerned.

When I was running the Troubadour, there was this transition from the classic singer/songwriter Jackson Browne types to bands like Black Flag, the Dead Kennedys, and Fear. Those are just some that come to mind. Oh, and Adam Ant! The Fear fans wanted to 'crush' the Ants. These guys hated each other.

The Ramones are an original rock and roll group of 1975, and their songs are brief, to the point, and every one a potential hit single.

I never thought of Green Day as a punk band. Just bubblegum, really.

We were just a bunch of high school kids who got into the Ramones together.

I never met Johnny Rotten, and I didn't want to meet Johnny Rotten.

I went to UC Berkeley for college, and it was during the period when the whole punk movement was happening.

The last true punk band to get a major label contract was The Dickies.

I was in a little punk band and we put out a few punk records that weren't very political, at all.

In Fall Out Boy, we were all playing with our pop punk influences, so that was always within that kind of framework.

I started going to Madame Louise's, the lesbian club where all the punk bands used to go - the Sex Pistols, the Clash. I remember seeing Billy Idol walk in there; he was gorgeous.

I think people are too hard on the Pistols. The Pistols started the whole punk thing and never saw much money.

There are several books out on punk history, but I haven't read any of them. I was there.

The first Decline I did was out of sheer love and appreciation for the music. In 1977, it was more about bands, because punk was a new form of music. It was groundbreaking and political.

After the Ramones, it was more about new wave for me than punk.

I didn't really see the British punk movement, if that's what it was, as wildly original, because I had been listening so intently to all the New York music since 1973, really.

People called me the godmother of punk, but I never name myself anything.

The bands that were big in '77, like the Clash and the Sex Pistols and Talking Heads, I got into them in the early '80s. And it changed my life. It got into my DNA.

I was actually late to the punk movement because I was too young.

When punk came along, it made perfect sense to me. I found it melodic. The Clash, Buzzcocks.

I think punk rock needs an 'Amadeus.'

I saw G.G. Allin live once.