Thurston Moore Quotes

Lyric writing is an interesting process in Sonic Youth. There's three people writing now, and we've all had a lot of interest and involvement with expression through words.

Whenever I can afford to do something, I do it.

I wanted to hear the songs in the way that I had written them, which was very basic. All I wanted was drums and another guitar, and I was just going to sing.

A lot of the lyrical ideas do have a lot of meaning in a way, although it is somewhat abstracted.

Anyone who grows up with parents who are very influential, there are cases where people run away from that if they have parents who are really lame.

I certainly don't sit around in the morning making pancakes listening to Whitehouse or anything.

Each member does whatever they want with the song and it totally changes it from whatever idea I hear around it. It turns it into a Sonic Youth song and completely away from it being a solo song.

go forth and thrash!

DEVO was like the punk band that non Punk America saw as Punk and so when people who were really into Punk rock would be walking around on the streets the jocks who learned about Punk through Devo would roll down their windows and yell at the Punks: 'HEY, DEVO!!'

Kids think of us as being totally over the hill.

It's hard for bands to stick it out because people grow up, and it never really pays off. If you're looking for some sort of payoff, it's not gonna happen.

Noise has taken the place of punk rock. People who play noise have no real aspirations to being part of the mainstream culture. Punk has been co-opted, and this subterranean noise music and the avant-garde folk scene have replaced it

Hits are for squares.

It's American Alternative radio stations that bug me. We're considered Alternative, but don't expect us to be played next to Blink 182 and Offspring. We're hardly of that generation.

We're like old people now playing music. I'm so glad we stuck it out because it's a lot better. I used to feel kind of anxious. Now our apprenticeship is over.

I don't really care about, Oh I really have to sell these things.

We're playing all these weird festivals, usually outdoors.

Tonight I am going to defecate on stage because I think that is the only way to express the nature of my soul according to rock and roll.

I never go back and listen to the recorded document. The thrill comes when the balance can be attained. Everyone in the room can have a shared, communal rock experience.

Every now and again, the alternative culture is cherished by the mainstream for what it is, rather than how it should be, like the mainstream popular music.

I never do releases to try and make or break some contemporary band.

People ... of the universe! Tonight ... is the night.. when the skies will open, and spray forth a divine hand with pointed finger! And it will say ... everybody ... you're not just a duck ... YOU ARE HUMAN! YOU ARE HUMAAAAN!!!

We're all very sensitive that Jim has the shortest history with the band. He wants to be somewhat of a free agent. I'm just going to let time dictate how Jim's future evolves.

I grew up in the early '70s in New England.

No one really gets rich doing this. A couple people do, Black Sabbath does. We don't sell any records anymore.

We never notate our music, so you can try to replicate it, but you don't really have it.