Billy Gibbons Quotes

I have loved music so much from when I was little, and I don't know whether it was because I saw my dad doing it and then I got the idea; I don't know what came first... But I always had a hairbrush in the mirror singing. I was always with him backstage; I would go out and be pulled in for the last song.

Music's been with me from the get-go. It was always around me as a kid. Dad got me my first guitar when I was 11 and, at school, if you wanted to be cool you had to be in a band.

Music was just played all around me, and I couldn't run from it. My pops, he never learned to sing, but he'd have his little drink on the side, and he'd put on the best of his hits - gangster rap or oldies - and he'd sing all day on his mic plugged up to the wall set-up. It's a trip. I've just seen that my whole life, so I've always just had a love for music. By the time I was 13, I really just jumped in it. And it's something I took on to have as a hobby.

B.B. King will be remembered for his impressive skills on the guitar, that King defined the blue genre.

My dad bought me a guitar when I was very young, and I never looked back.

I'm a guitar player, really - I mean, first and foremost - I grew up with all that great 1960s music, in terms of growing up, becoming a musician, so it's like first-love stuff; I'm always going to go back to it.

I've always loved music, but I never really played anything. After 'Walk the Line' and learning to play guitar, and having that sense of performing, I think that certainly opened the door for me, for music.

When I was a small boy, 10, 11, 12, probably somewhere around there, when I first heard a blues song on the radio, it was a jolt of electricity. It grabbed me by the throat, it made me shiver. And I knew from that moment that this was for me and this would be with me for the rest of my life.

I asked for a guitar when I was 8 years old for Christmas. I have no idea why. I never had any guitar heroes. I still don't. But there must have been something in me because I've been playing for 30 years.

What I do now is all my dad's fault, because he bought me a guitar as a boy, for no apparent reason.

Music was always part of my life - my mother says I came out singing. I wanted to be Gene Kelly - or Judy Garland.

For me, I guess music has always been the through-line. You know, I played guitar from a really young age, and my dad played, and my cousin gave me a drum kit when I was 13, and I played bass guitar, so, you know, it was definitely always in the house.

When I was 14, I heard Otis Redding in a club local to me, and I was blown away. It leaped out at me and went straight to my heart. I set my sights on singing like that.

Growing up and playing guitar with my dad and stuff like really influenced me. It definitely must've had an impact on why Miley wanted to sing and why I wanted to sing and play guitar as well.

Music is my first love, as it's in my blood.

Growing up, I was always around adult musicians who played for their entire lives. So that's what I wanted to do, and I always had that in mind.

For a little kid like me, growing up in Carle Place, you put on John Lee Hooker late at night, and it's a different reality. I try to feel that music from the inside out because I was really attracted to it.

When I was around 11, my dad took me to see Santana live, and then I got 'Sacred Fire,' and everything changed for me.

I actually wanted to be a jazz musician first. My grandparents introduced me to Louis Armstrong. I loved Louis Armstrong so I took up the trumpet and just did that every day and practiced that.

One of many joyful moments with BB King was him letting me play 'Lucille.' ...The thrill will never be gone.

What draws people to the instrument is the love for guitar players that play a certain way. I mean, even though it wasn't intentional, it was hard to avoid copying Eddie Van Halen. He was basically the *bleep* back then.

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

I started taking piano lessons when I was about four years old. My parents were both musicians. So I took piano lessons. I didn't like the lessons very much, but I was enchanted by music. Music always transported me somewhere. Singing made feel good and being able to play the piano made me feel good.

The musical flags of the world should fly at half mast because truly one of the greatest guitarists in the world and king of the blues has died. I have cherished him and so has the rest of the world who knew him and loved him for his entire career. As we pain, we must celebrate that his music, his style of playing and singing will last forever, from the recordings that he has done and the influence that he has had and will have on guitarists all over this planet. Long live the spirit of B.B. King.

I started out playing guitar because Jimi Hendrix was my hero, so my roots were really based on Jimi Hendrix and his style of playing.