Quotations

[Daniel Edwards]

What follows is one result of a Stones mania that I developed after
buying the newly released Tattoo You album at the age of 15. After
reading countless books and spending thousands of dollars building my
stones collection, I started to keep track of quotations that I felt
reflected that image of the Stones.

Once infected by the Stones bug it will not take long to find out that
almost everything said or reported about the band is likely to be
disputed in one way or another. You will see variations of these
quotes and denials of their accuracy in various books and magazine
articles. I have tried to use the most popular version of the “facts”
in compiling this listing.

To me the Stones are more of a way of life and religion than a mere
rock and roll band. Please feel free to email pictures etc. to me so
that I can include them in another of my hobbies: Rolling Stone BBS
(970-532-4911 28.8bps).

You will find that Keith has the lions share of the quotes below. He
is my hero and although I have never had the pleasure of meeting him
in person I know his legend well.

"For a time we were in danger of being respectable"
- Keith Richards

"If you're going to kick authority in the teeth you might as well use
two feet."
- Keith Richards

"It's so large you could put Pink Floyd in the corner."
- Keith Richards on the Voodoo Lounge 1994 world tour stage

"I can't remember sacrifices at this stage of the game."
- Keith Richards

"It's all right letting yourself go, as long as you can let yourself
back."
- Mick Jagger

"We know a lot of people don't like us because they say we're scruffy
and don't wash. So what! They don't have to come and look at us, do
they? If they don't like me they can keep away."
- Mick Jagger, 1964

"All you've got to do is delete the words 'punk rock' and write in
'Rolling Stones' and you've got the same press as you had fifteen
years ago... they've made the press play the same old games as they
played with us. They puked at London Airport, we pissed in the
filling station."
- Keith Richards commenting on the Sex Pistols

"I despise those cunts. The Stones should have quit in 1965. You
never see any of these cunts walking down the street. If it gets so
you can't see us that way. I don't want it."
- Sid Vicious of the Sex Pistols commenting on the Rolling Stones

"The problem with all those people relating to 'Satisfaction' is that
they want to drag you back. Or they want you to drag them back, which
is worse."
- Keith Richards

"I give the Stones about another two years. I'm saving for the
future. I bank all my song royalties, for a start."
- Mick Jagger, 1964

"A lot of people start to fall to bits a thirty- that's why it's
dangerous. I don't fall to bits at all. Quite honestly, once you are
able to reproduce, you're over the hill. You start to go downhill at
eighteen, physically."
- Mick Jagger

"Decca are supposed to be making records, but they might just as
easily be making baked beans. A record, to them is just a piece of
plastic and what's on there doesn't really matter."
- Keith Richards

"I'd rather the Mafia than Decca."
- Keith Richards

"People say I made The Rolling Stones. I didn't. They were there
already. They only wanted exploiting."
- Andrew Loog Oldham

"I left the Rolling Stones because I wanted to be a rock 'n' roll
star."
- Mick Taylor

"I wanted to be an actress and a scholar, too. My first move was to
get a Rolling Stone as a boyfriend. I slept with three then decided
the singer was the best bet."
- Marianne Faithful

"I'm thinking about entering politics, really doing it this time. I'd
love to do it. But I haven't got the right wife."
- Mick Jagger

"What would I have been if I hadn't joined the Stones? A layabout,
but a very high-class one."
- Keith Richards

"I was just a hired guitar player when we started."
- Keith Richards

"I can't help it if I've never looked healthy."
- Keith Richards

"The trouble with me is that I have to be kicked up the arse, but
there's no-one who can do it."
- Mick Jagger

"I'd rather be dead than singing 'Satisfaction' when I'm forty-five."
- Mick Jagger

"I must say I don't like singing very much. I'm not really a good
enough singer to really enjoy it, but I am getting into it a little
bit."
- Mick Jagger

"I don't like rock 'n' roll anyway."
- Mick Jagger

"It's a noise we make, that's all. You could be kind and call it
music."
- Mick Jagger

"What we do is derivative, very derivative."
- Mick Jagger

"Nine months of listening to The Stones isn't my idea of heaven."
- Mick Jagger commenting on recording

"Altamont, it could only happen to The Stones. Let's face it. It
wouldn't happen to The Bee Gees and it wouldn't happen to Crosby,
Stills and Nash."
- Keith Richards

"It's really difficult to get out of gossip columns once you're in
them."
- Mick Jagger

"I do think it's strange that all we ever talk about is me."
- Bianca Jagger

"I never was a teenager; I don't remember doing any teenage songs."
- Mick Jagger

"So I get on this fucking train one morning and there's Jagger and
under his arm he has four or five albums. I haven't seen him since
the time I bought an ice-cream off him and we haven't hung around
together since we were five, six, ten years old. We recognized each
other straight off... and under his arm he's got Chuck Berry and
Little Walter, Muddy Waters...
- Keith Richards commenting on meeting up with Mick Jagger

"Michael could be a very good impersonator if he wanted to; he could
probably make a living from it."
- Eva Jagger (Mick's mother)

"If Jesus Christ came to town, he couldn't sell more tickets."
- Wolfman Jack commenting on the Stones 1972 tour of America

"I only get ill when I give up drugs."
- Keith Richards

"For most people the fantasy is driving around in a big car, having
all the chicks you want and being able to pay for it. It always has
been, still is, and always will be. And anyone who says it isn't is
talking bullshit."
- Mick Jagger

"I think drugs are purely a matter for the person concerned. It's
like a blow Job - in some states it's illegal. It's just a matter of
how much people are prepared to put up with so-called authorities
prying into their lives."
- Keith Richards

"I'm extremely careful. I've never turned blue in someone else's
bathroom. I consider that the height of bad manners. I've had so
many people do it to me and it's not really on, as far as drug
etiquette goes, to turn blue in someone else's john."
- Keith Richards

"Subversive? Of course we're subversive. But if they really believe
that you can start a revolution with a record, they're wrong. I wish
we could. We're more subversive at live appearances."
- Keith Richards, 1969

"I wouldn't let Grace Slick blow me."
- Mick Jagger

"Domesticity is death."
- Mick Jagger

"He sure left his mark, that cat. I know of five kids; at least. All
by different chicks and they all look like Brian."
- Keith Richards

"So we had an affair. You must be pretty bad, I don't even remember
you."
- Bianca Jagger to Warren Beatty, after he had told Hollywood gossip
writers of their alleged affair.

"You don't want my trousers to fall down, now do you?"
- Mick Jagger on stage

"I'm changing my image - I'm going to get my teeth fixed."
- Keith Richards, 1964

"Let's go watch Mick put on his makeup - that's always good for a
laugh."
- Ron Wood

"I'll just keep on rocking and hope for the best."
- Keith Richards

"If you don't get as much money as you can possibly get, then I think
you are stupid."
- Mick Jagger

"About all I'll end up with is a white suit and a thousand dollars."
- Mick Jagger commenting on The Stones 1975 tour of America, for which
he actually earned around $450,000.

"Nobody believes me that I came into music just because I wanted the
bread."
- Mick Jagger

"People were asking for it. All those nude, fat people. They had
victims faces."
- Keith Richards commenting on the murder at Altamont

"People expect a lot more of us than they do everybody else."
- Mick Jagger

"I find it a drag that certain people need to project their death
wishes on me. I've no preoccupation with death whatsoever."
- Keith Richards

"It's amazing that people want to know about my soap opera."
- Mick Jagger

"You can't take fucking record like other people take a bible."
- Keith Richards

"I thought we stood for infinity."
- Mick Jagger

"As long as my picture is on the front page, I don't care what they
say about me on page ninety-six."
- Mick Jagger

"I don't care what Johnny Rotten says about me. Everything he says is
only because he loves me 'cos I'm so good. He says nasty things about
me because he has to. Because, along with the Queen, y'know, I'm one
of the best things England's got. Me, and the Queen."
- Mick Jagger

"I don't think people mind if I'm conceited. Every rock 'n' roll star
in the world is conceited."
- Mick Jagger

"Me and Nureyev have flaming rows about whether it takes more talent
and discipline to be a ballet dancer or a pop singer."
- Mick Jagger

"Happy X mas to all those starving hairdressers and their families."
- Ad for Rolling Stones in 'New Musical Express', early 1960s

"He's the only dirty man I know who doesn't smell."
- Ron Wood on Keith Richards

"Keith Richards is the devils right hand man."
- Kenneth Anger

"He stole my music but he gave me my name."
- Muddy Waters commenting on Mick Jagger

"Brian worked at being a rebel. Keith was born a rebel."
- Ian Stewart (Road Manager and '6th stone')

"Take it back three or four thousand years - take it back to the cat
who found a bone and beat the bone on the rock... and started to yell
at the full moon - and then you might have the original song - and
that's rock 'n' roll."
- Keith Richards

"Brian and Keith never spoke to me until they found out I had some
cigarettes."
- Bill Wyman

"We couldn't hear ourselves for years. It was impossible to play on
stage."
- Keith Richards

"Caos. Police and People fainting, gasping, tits hanging out, chicks
choking nurses running around with ambulances."
- Keith Richards on a typical 60's gig

"Living up to an image is the biggest drag about touring."
- Mick Jagger

"I promise you, they'll never be back on my show."
-Ed Sullivan on the Stones 1964

"He was one of those people who are so beautiful in one way, and such
an asshole in another."
- Keith Richards on Brian Jones

"I know I'm not the world's greatest bass player."
- Bill Wyman

"It depends if you're ready. Same with alcohol. You should find out
what it does. If you don't know what it does and you're just putting
it in for the sake of it, you're a dummy."
- Keith Richards on Drugs

"It's not the Rolling Stones that destroys people. They do it to
themselves."
- Mick Jagger

"I thought Satanic Majesties was a load of crap."
- Keith Richards

"I was on and off junk (heroin) for ten years, but - and I want to
make this clear - that doesn't prescribe it for anybody else."
- Keith Richards

"You can be seen by millions of people and still be the loneliest
person in the world."
- Ronnie Wood

"Miraculously, due to abstinence and prayer my teeth grew back!"
- Keith Richards

"Voodoo Lounge? Kind of like Beggars Banquet. Right number of
syllables."
- Mick Jagger

"When I was on heroin, I still beat Mick at tennis."
- Keith Richards

"I think to myself every day what a lucky bastard I am. I've never
had to get a job."
- Keith Richards on his musical career.

"The only things Mick and I disagree about is the band, the music and
what we do."
- Keith Richards

"I don't think honestly you'll find anyone who liked Brian (Jones)
Brian was not a likable guy."
- Keith Richards

"Maybe Bill's (Wyman) happy running his restaurants and marrying
people he never sees again. I don't know."
- Keith Richards

"I don't think that rock'n'roll songwriters should worry about Art. I

don't think it comes into it. A lot of it is just craft anyway,
especially after doing it for a long time...As far as I'm concerned,
Art is just short for Arthur."
- Keith Richards

"My one worry is falling over on stage. This may sound absurd, but I
actually slipped on a hamburger in Hamburg once, and almost fell off
stage."
- Keith Richards

"Like I said many years ago, I've never had a problem with drugs, only
with cops."
- Keith Richards

"I would rather be a legend than a dead legend"
- Keith Richards

"You really can't say smack contributed to me not being able to
function anywhere. I even got skiing together when I was a junkie. I
wonder how many people have done that?"
- Keith Richards on the making of "Exile on Main Street (1972)"

"To me as a musician, your canvas is silence and what you do is fuck
around with silence. Same with painting, you are confronted with a
rectangular empty space and you splash paint all over it."
- Keith Richards (1988)

"There's really only one song it the whole world, and probably Adam
and Eve hummed it to each other, and everything else is a variation on
it in one form or another, you know?"
- Keith Richards (1989)

"White drummers don't swing, except for Charlie Watts."
- Keith Richards (1977)

"I just lay back and fatten the sound."
- Bill Wyman (1974)

"It took the cops a full half hour to wake me up. It's pretty
frightening waking up with the cops all round your bed."
- Keith Richards (1977)

"You could be sick as a dog but as long as you've got a suntan,
everybody thinks that you're in great shape."
- Keith Richards (1978)

"I'm along with the Queen, y'know - one of the best things England's
got - me and the Queen."
- Mick Jagger (1978)

"How come all the teenies ever wanna do is tongue my diamond tooth?"
- Mick Jagger (1975)

"One realizes, after a while, that indiscriminate association with the

opposite sex has its drawbacks."
- Keith Richards

"If you're gonna be a band, you can't sit in the studio the whole
time... I'd like to do more of the only thing I can do really well,
apart from screwing."
- Keith Richards (1977)

"Brian never wrote a single finished song in his life. His paranoia
was far too great."
- Keith Richards

"The money, dear, the money. If you don't go for as much money as you

possibly get, then I reckon your just fuckin' stoopid!"
- Mick Jagger (1977)

"I've always said, if you can't take a joke, it's too fuckin' bad."
Mick Jagger (1978)

"Rock 'n' roll's not over. I don't like to see one thing end until
you see another beginning. Like when you break up with a woman.
D'y'know what I mean?"
- Mick Jagger (1971)

"Marriage? It's all right for those who wash."
- Mick Jagger (1967)

"If they wrote about me as the sweet, gentle, loving family man, it
would probably do me more damage. And be equally untrue."
- Mick Jagger on the media

"Miraculously, due to abstinence and prayer my teeth grew back!"
- Keith Richards (1979)

"When I was a junkie I used to be able to play tennis with Mick, go
into the toilet for a quick fix, and still beat him."
- Keith Richards

"Rock 'n' roll, it's a few moments when you can forget about the nukes
and racism and all the other evils God's kindly thrown upon us."
- Keith Richards

"You can't keep it up with sixteen-year-old girls for ever. They're
very demanding."
- Mick Jagger

"I'm afraid rock has no future."
- Mick Jagger

"I've never had problems with drugs, I've had problems with the
police."
- Keith Richards

"I must say, in fairness to the poppy, that never once have I had a
bad cold."
- Keith Richards

"Marrying Bianca was one of those mistakes we all make from time to
time, but never again."
- Mick Jagger

"We piss anywhere, man."
- Brian Jones

"I only got into rock n' roll for a bit of fun and to see the world
for a couple of years."
- Bill Wyman

"There was nothing about love, peace and flowers in 'Jumping Jack
Flash'."
- Mick Jagger

"My old man was in the army and my ma took me out shopping for an hour
or two and a V1, you know, the doodlebug... we came back and the house
was destroyed, it landed right on my crib. Adolf was on my tail. The
bastard was after me."
- Keith Richards

"I don't think anything about them (Jagger's solo albums). Personally,
I don't think he should think anything about them either."
- Keith Richards

"Ronnie lives near us in New York. He comes round to me or I go to see
him if the old lady locks me out. "
- Keith Richards

"Five strings, three notes, two fingers, an asshole, and you've got
it!"
- Keith Richards on Rock and Roll

"When the prosecuting counsel asked me about chicks in nothing but fur
rugs, I said 'I'm not concerned with your petty morals, which are
illegitimate.' They couldn't take that one..."
- Keith Richards

"I'm tired of being number one in the naughty boys drug poll. It's
time they picked on somebody else."
- Keith Richards

"Being famous is OK, but in the courtroom it only works against you."
- Keith Richards

"He's still in love with his music, and literally the lines disappear
from his face when he picks up that guitar. "
- Bono

"I wouldn't piss on Keith Richards if he was on fire."
- Sid Vicious

"Keith is the sort of guy you should leave alone. He's the classic
naughty boy. He's the sort of guy I knew at school who hated the head
boy. And I love Keith because of that."
- Charlie Watts

"In guys particularly, junk takes the place of everything. You don't
need a chick, you don't need music, you don't need nothing. It
doesn’t get you anywhere. It's not called junk for nothing."
- Keith Richards

"When you look Keith in he eye, you know you're not going to bullshit
him, and when you are going to bullshit him, do not look him in the
eye."
- Steve Jordan

"I'm a Sagittarius, half-man, half horse, with a license to shit in
the street."
- Keith Richards