John Bonham Quotes

I was curious and hungry at a young age, and jazz was such a mystery to me, an ocean where you can express yourself in the moment. It represented freedom, it represented wearing wings and going somewhere with music.

The musicians in the band, and myself as a performer, love the risks of the unpredictable and the feeling of jumping off cliffs musically.

Don't play the saxophone. Let it play you.

When I play a solo I'm just expressing that moment. It can go horribly wrong easily enough.

What I want to happen is to be really creative, and to play something new in the improvisations, every time.

Any talk of 'craft' makes me laugh. My music looks outward; it does not gaze upon itself in admiration. Artisanal is for cheesemakers. I don't know anything about music theory. Every time I approach my guitar, it's like the first time. There's no craft in that.

I look at my clarinet sometimes and I think, I wonder what's going to come out of there tonight? You never know.

The music always takes us to different places. We'll just continue to play and see what doors open from there.

Music takes me where I go. I'm always open to wherever the journey will take me.

If you're always playing the correct notes, there's something wrong - you're not searching; you're not reaching for anything.

In the past, we never really had that kind of spontaneity on record. When you start touring, you play songs in a certain way and then I start to feel like it's tough to really get lost in my playing.

When you're playing the same dirty dozen night after night, the moments that keep it fresh are those when you just let go and trust everyone.

Jazz stands for freedom. It's supposed to be the voice of freedom: Get out there and improvise, and take chances, and don't be a perfectionist - leave that to the classical musicians.

I'm by no means a pianist. I think that's safe to say, but the piano, for me, I would say it's the enabler. It gave me what I needed and gives me what I need in order to write a song. And I think playing or improvising on the piano is where I feel most liberated and sort of less conscious of all my insecurities or inadequacies.

I never set out to write a certain kind of song, I just play my guitar and see if I catch something.

When I start playing I'm just a rollercoaster of sound. I don't know what's coming next, I never do, and I sit and sign and talk to the people afterwards.

I didn't really know what I was doing when I started. I just started writing songs. After two songs I just continued to explore it.

I was in the studio so much, it was about the search for air in a metaphoric sense, and the breathing has more to do with travel for me, about the search musically for open air.

The rule is to try and never play the same thing twice when you have the freedom to do that in the song.

I didn't know how to play lead guitar. There was a freedom in not knowing how to do it.

Jazz is pretty much the freest thing you can be a part of. It's the closest thing I can get to flying. It's fun, interactive. In its own way, it's a sport.

All of my solos were improvised initially - I would go in and get my bearings and see what I came up with.

I'm a person of change and I must be honest to my artistry and my creativity. That's part of the word 'jazz'... it's an adventure.

You're just sort of searching for this 'thing' and sometimes you get it and sometimes you don't. All music is imperfect, but in jazz since you're improvising, at least the way I play, I'm trying to follow my train of thought in a solo.

For me, something will come in my head and I'll either end up calling my cell phone to record it, or I'll just pick my guitar up and see what comes out. Sometimes it sucks, sometimes it doesn't. So there's really no set method behind it.