The Storyteller: Tales Of Life And Music Quotes
"My head and my heart seem to play this cruel trick on me, deceiving me with the false illusion of youth by greeting the world every day through the idealistic, mischievous eyes of a rebellious child finding happiness and appreciation in the most basic, simple things."
"Not everything needs a shine, after all. If you leave a Pelham Blue Gibson Trini Lopez guitar in the case for fifty years, it will look like it was just delivered from the factory. But if you take it in your hands, show it to the sun, let it breathe, sweat on it, and fucking PLAY it, over time the finish will turn a unique shade. And each instrument ages entirely differently. To me, that is beauty."
"I have never been one to collect 'stuff,' I do collect moments."
"DNA is a miraculous thing. We all carry traits of people we have never met somewhere deep within our chemistry."
"I was blessed with a genetic symphony, waiting to perform. All it took was that spark."
"There is no love like a mother's love. It is life's greatest song."
"Maybe my Silvertone could help me heal my wounded heart. Maybe I could write my way out of this mess."
"The sweet sting of a love refused is powerful enough to send any scribe scrambling for pen and paper, aching to find beauty in the pain of being eighty-sixed by another."
"You have my promise, right now, that the Foo Fighters... we’re gonna come back and finish this show..."
"Stay with me, stay with me, tonight you better stay with me!!!"
"How about this... You go to the hospital and get a brace, I’m gonna go sit down and play, and when you return, we’ll put it on."
"These are the days it never rains but it pours..."
"Everything’s fine! We’re just going to the hospital so that they can take pictures of my bones... it’s really cool!"
"YOU PICK YOURSELF UP OFF THE GROUND. YOU WALK HOME. THE SHOW MUST GO ON."
"This was the first day of the rest of my life."
"All you needed was three chords, an open mind, and a microphone."
"It was a feeling of freedom that I had waited for my entire life, and now that I’d been baptized by spit and sweat and broken glass, there was no turning back."
"I have to think that I manifested my destiny that night, utilizing the Law of Attraction."
"Okay... so, you wanna play some Zeppelin or AC/DC or something?"
"It’s not always the kid that fails the school. Sometimes it’s the school that fails the kid."
"Not only does the van serve as your equipment truck, carefully packed to fit an entire backline of gear inside, but it also becomes your home away from home."
"It’s not for everyone, I can tell you that. It takes a certain type of person with a certain type of disposition to survive months in what seems like a miniature submarine with wheels."
"Being confined to such a small space with so many people for such long periods of time actually benefits the little time you have onstage."
"One of the first stops on that tour was CBGB’s in New York City... This was punk rock ground zero, the epicenter of the soundtrack of my youth."
"The sight of the iconic awning above the front door sent shivers down my spine."
"To really see America, you need to drive it mile by mile, because you not only begin to grasp the immensity of this beautiful country, you see the climate and geography change with every state line."
"The education I was getting out here on the road proved to be far more valuable to me than any algebra or biology test I had ever failed."
"FROM ONE OCEAN TO THE OTHER, I HAD CROSSED THE COUNTRY ON NOTHING MORE THAN THE LOVE OF MUSIC AND THE WILL TO SURVIVE."
"But the border crossings were always interesting... imagine the delight of a customs official when a gang of young punks would pull up in a van bearing Netherlands license plates."
"I was beginning to think that maybe Skeeter’s dedication to the band wasn’t the same as Pete’s, Franz’s, and mine. We would have done anything and everything to keep the wheels from falling off."
"AND THEN I HEARD THE FIVE WORDS THAT CHANGED MY LIFE FOREVER: 'HAVE YOU HEARD OF NIRVANA?'"
"You have to put your needs ahead of others’. You have to take care of yourself."
"I wish that I knew what I know now when I was younger."
"BECAUSE EVERY DAY IS STILL A BLANK PAGE, WAITING TO WRITE ITSELF."
"WE WERE SURROUNDED, AND THERE WAS NO WAY OUT."
"If Australia was another hemisphere, Japan was another fucking planet."
"Every few songs, a fan would finally lose it and begin running to the stage, only to be intercepted by a pair of white gloves and ejected from the show."
"It was us versus them, I thought. I played even harder."
"At twenty-three years old, I had never owned a credit card or an ATM card, or even had a bank account with more than a hundred dollars in it (thank you, Grandma), so this was a game changer."
"Awwww shit, I thought. We’re gonna feast tonight . . ."
"This is, perhaps, the best piece of advice he or anyone has ever given me still to this day."
"Being the faceless drummer of the band, I was lucky to walk through life practically unrecognized."
"As we drove up to the house on Cielo Drive, my anticipation was laced with trepidation."
"I felt ashamed at times that I could not feel, but eventually I accepted that there is no right or wrong way to grieve."
"I will always be 'that guy from Nirvana,' and I am proud of it."
"We weren’t obligated to be a band anymore. We didn’t have to do it, we wanted to do it, proving our intention to be pure."
"I eventually settled for a more reasonable house on one and a half acres outside of historic Old Town Alexandria."
"It wasn’t a band. It was a force of fucking nature."
"For a moment, I forgot that we were even on the bill that day."
"I stopped trying to understand fate and destiny a long time ago, but dumb luck seems to be my specialty."
"This was a home. This was a family. This is what I wanted."
"The relationship between a father and daughter can be one of the most special relationships in any girl’s life."
"I remember the first time I had to leave Violet behind for tour. I stood above her crib as she slept, and I began to cry."
"This was a love I had never experienced before."
"As much as it’s considered a nonpolitical event, there is an inevitable tension that permeates the proceedings."
"I would sit at the bar nursing my ginger ale while listening to the booming voices of these Beltway news junkies, agreeing to disagree on current events, saving any real debate for when the House was in session Monday morning."
"This was the Washington, DC, I was raised to know, a place where people with opposing ideas could engage in civilized discourse without it turning into a barroom brawl."
"The president was taller than I’d expected, and the First Lady had the most beautiful blue eyes."
"If only Nathan’s bar in Georgetown were still open, I bet the two of us would have a rather eventful Sunday afternoon."
"I can’t be the only one who’s nervous here, I thought."
"I TURNED TO MY GIRLFRIEND FOR TRANSLATION, AND SHE INFORMED ME, 'THOSE ARE NOT DREAMS.'"
"Life is just too damn short to let someone else’s opinion steer the wheel."
"NOT A DAY GOES BY WHERE I DON’T STOP AND THANK THE UNIVERSE FOR THESE OTHERWORLDLY BLESSINGS, AND I MAKE IT A POINT TO TAKE NOTHING FOR GRANTED."
"I WANTED TO FUCKING TEAR THAT THEATER TO SHREDS."
"IF I AM GOING TO PLAY MUSIC IN A BAND, I THOUGHT, I’M GOING TO DO IT LIKE THAT."
"BECAUSE I STILL WALK THROUGH THIS LIFE LIKE A LITTLE BOY IN A MUSEUM, SURROUNDED BY THE EXHIBITS I’VE SPENT A LIFETIME STUDYING, AND WHEN I FINALLY COME FACE-TO-FACE WITH SOMETHING OR SOMEONE THAT HAS INSPIRED ME ALONG THE WAY, I AM THANKFUL. I AM GRATEFUL."
"No matter what, a girl can always rely on her dear old dad."
"You do what you have to do to get to the gig. Always."
"My pride was now that of a father watching his daughters discovering independence, no longer clinging to their doting parent, but rather finding their own world outside of the one we had created together."
"I have always felt like a bit of an alien, which obviously I learned to embrace over time."
"The courage to be yourself that bridges those opposing emotions, and when it does, magic can happen."
"Fatherhood eclipsed any dream, any wish, any song I had ever written."
"I LOVE MY CHILDREN AS I WAS LOVED AS A CHILD, AND I PRAY THAT THEY WILL DO THE SAME WHEN THEIR TIME COMES."
"Music had become my counselor when I needed guidance, my friend when I felt alone, my father when I needed love, my preacher when I needed hope, and my partner when I needed to belong."
"I was born to let my freak flag fly and celebrate all of life’s beautiful eccentricities."
"The stability and security that we had all longed for as children of divorce and teenage rebellion were now found in a barrage of distorted guitars and laser-lit stages."
"Through her unconditional love for me, she showed me how to love others unconditionally."