Lou Reed Quotes

But it's the things that preceded it that made that happen, and of course now someone like me thinks, well, if I can do that ... then there are a lot of other things that are possible. ~ Lou Reed

I can concentrate on my art. ~ Lou Reed

You can't beat 2 guitars, bass, and drums. ~ Lou Reed

I don't know anyone actually who does care what a critic says. ~ Lou Reed

You can't beat two guitars, bass, and drums. ~ Lou Reed

Kill them now, cause I need some kicks. I need some kicks, I'm getting bored. ~ Lou Reed

Things always seem to end before they start ~ Lou Reed

Here's to Mulberry Jane
She made jam when she came
Somebody cut off her feet
Now jelly rolls in the street. ~ Lou Reed

The sickness of the mother runs on through the girl, leaving her small and helpless. Liquor flies through her brain with the force of a gun, leaving her running in circles. ~ Lou Reed

Some people drink to unleash their libidos, and other people drink to prop up their egos. ~ Lou Reed

I don't think anybody is anybody else's moral compass. Maybe listening to my music is not the best idea if you live a very constricted life. Or maybe it is. ~ Lou Reed

I don't think I'm in any position to call myself a martial artist. I'm a student of the martial arts. ~ Lou Reed

First thing you learnis that you'vealways got to wait ~ Lou Reed

Well, everybody does something, some people race cars, others collect stamps, I find tai chi to be philosophically, aesthetically, physically and spiritually fascinating. ~ Lou Reed

I'm tearing down Route 80 East, the sun's on my right side. I'm drunk, but my vision's good. ~ Lou Reed

I had started also studying because I wanted to learn more about power and fighting. ~ Lou Reed

My God is rock'n'roll. ~ Lou Reed

When I record an album I'm trying to get as close as possible to that perfect moment. ~ Lou Reed

I wanna hear some Diana Ross, I wanna hear some Marvin Gaye. I wanna hear a song that reminds me of a better day. ~ Lou Reed

You know, when you're relaxed, you're putting it out there, and then it comes, oh, I can do that. ~ Lou Reed

That's why I survived because I still believe I've got something to say. ~ Lou Reed

The period right before punk rock where people like Lou Reed and Iggy Pop were really strong. ~ Arto Lindsay

Let's do what you fear most
That from which you recoil
But which still makes your eyes moist ~ Lou Reed

I learned loudness from working with Lou Reed. ~ Robert Wilson

Teach them about anger, the sin that comes with dawning. Teach them about flowers, and the beauty of forgiveness. ~ Lou Reed

Magic And Loss (The Summation)
They say no one person can do it all
But you want to in your head
But you can't be Shakespeare and you can't be Joyce
So what is left instead
You're stuck with yourself and a rage that can hurt you
You have to start at the beginning again
And just this moment
This wonderful fire started up again
When you pass through humble, when you pass through sickly
When you pass through, I'm better than you all
When you pass through anger and self deprecation
And have the strength to acknowledge it all
When the past makes you laugh and you can savor the magic
That let you survive your own war
You find that that fire is passion
And there's a door up ahead, not a wall ~ Lou Reed

Why don't you swallow razor blades? ~ Lou Reed

If someone teaches you alignment and - I'm not a tai chi expert by any stretch - so interviewing me about tai chi is kind of the cart before the horse - but just from my point of view as a student, it's simply that Master Ren can show you the relationship of power, stance and form. ~ Lou Reed

I think life is far too short to concentrate on your past. I rather look into the future. ~ Lou Reed

How could you even dream or think something of someone who is as uncommercial as I am? ~ Lou Reed

Just a perfect day, problems all left alone. ~ Lou Reed

If it has more than three chords, it's jazz. ~ Lou Reed

These are really terribly rough times, and we really should try to be as nice to each other as possible. ~ Lou Reed

I'll be your mirror
Reflect what you are
In case you don't know
I'll be the sun
The wind and the rain
The light on your door
To show that you're home.
When you think the nights as in your mind
Bent inside, you're twisted and unkind
Let me stand to show that you are blind
Please put down your hands, cause I see you.
I find it hard
To believe you don't know
The beauty you are
But if you don't
Let me be your eyes
A hand to your darkness
So you won't be afraid.
When you think the nights as in your mind
Bent inside, you're twisted and unkind
Let me stand to show that you are blind
Please put down your hands, cause I see you.
I'll be your mirror ~ Lou Reed

Music is an amazing thing. I don't know if we really think about it the same way we consider a painting an amazing thing. I mean, a painting is, in quotes, imaginary. There is nothing on the canvas when you start; and writing a song, there is nothing there when you start. ~ Lou Reed

I'm an artist and that means I can be as egotistical as I want to be. ~ Lou Reed

One chord is fine. Two chords are pushing it. Three chords and you're into jazz. ~ Lou Reed

Lou Reed is something like a personal favorite of mine, but you could always put me into that drawer of singers who can't really sing, who speak their songs. ~ Stephen Malkmus

In the late '70s I started to search for the perfect sound - whatever that might be, before that I was mainly interested in drugs, insanity and the rock'n'roll lifestyle. ~ Lou Reed

There are problems in these times, but none of them are mineI'm beginning to see the light ~ Lou Reed

People said that way back in the early days I was probably one of the first rappers; the reason is that I couldn't sing, so I had to talk! Lou Reed was probably the one who started it all. ~ Alan Vega

An eye for an eye is elemental. ~ Lou Reed

When I was in college, I had a jazz radio show. I called it 'Excursion on a Wobbly Rail,' after a Cecil Taylor song. I used to run around the Village following Ornette Coleman wherever he played. ~ Lou Reed

It's just a temporary thing. ~ Lou Reed

I've always believed that there's an amazing number of things you can do through a rock'n'roll song and that you can do serious writing in a rock song if you can somehow do it without losing the beat, ~ Lou Reed

But it's not only: What are you going to do about touring, it's: What are you going to do with your life? Is there a point to what we do? I think there is. Making music, creating beautiful things. We have to be in love with the good and the beautiful. If we are not, then you're in a nihilistic state. ~ Lou Reed

Life's like a mayonnaise soda. ~ Lou Reed

I'd harbored hopes that the intelligence that once inhabited novels or films would ingest rock. I was, perhaps, wrong. ~ Lou Reed

Raymond Chandler managed to write about L.A. his whole career. Should I keep going writing about New York? Is that what I should be doing? Songwriting doesn't work that way. ~ Lou Reed

They tied his arms behind his back to teach him how to swim, they put blood in his coffee and milk in his gin. ~ Lou Reed

Psychologically, it's better that I think that I'm dirt. ~ Lou Reed

All the people have gone to war leaving no interrogator to mind. ~ Lou Reed

When you're growing up in a small town
You know you'll grow down in a small town
There is only one good use for a small town
You hate it and you know you'll have to leave. ~ Lou Reed

You're a musician: You play. That's what you do. ~ Lou Reed

The myriad choices of his fate
Set themselves out upon a plate
For him to choose
What had he to lose ~ Lou Reed

Some even claim that I'm a terror, a dictator and they're right. ~ Lou Reed

It's depressing when you're still around and your albums are out of print. ~ Lou Reed

I'm waiting'/for my man/ got twenty-six dollars in my hand/ he's never early/he's always late/ the first thing you learn/ is you always gotta' wait'
-Waiting for the Man ~ Lou Reed

When critics ask you if you feel vindicated by other critics - I didn't like critics then, and I don't like them now. There you go. I've always been outside the mainstream, and it stayed that way. ~ Lou Reed

When you think the night has seen your mind, That inside your twisted and unkind, Let me stand to show that you are blind. Please put down you hands cause I see you. I'll be you mirror. ~ Lou Reed

The only thing constantly changing is change
The living only become dead
Your hair falling out
Your liver swelled up
Your teeth rot your gums and your chin
Your ass starts to sag
Your balls shrivel up
Your cock swallowed up in its sack
The only thing constantly changing is change
And it's always change on your back. ~ Lou Reed

I think that everything happens for a reason, everything happens when it's going to happen. ~ Lou Reed

If anyone ever had a heart
He wouldn't turn around and break it
If anyone ever played a part
he wouldn't turn around and hate it. ~ Lou Reed

I always thought martial arts was the most modern choreography we could have right now, and I always wanted to put it to music. ~ Lou Reed

Sound is more than just noise. Ordered sound is music. My life is music. ~ Lou Reed

One of my rules is: Never listen to your old stuff. ~ Lou Reed

I don't like the word rock opera, but I'm trying to write on that level that's reserved for plays still, or novels. ~ Lou Reed

Perfect Night has that magic and it has the raw energy that grabs you by the throat. ~ Lou Reed

I am bigger and stronger than ever. My Chen Taiji and health regimen has served me well all of these years, thanks to Master Ren Guang-yi. I look forward to being on stage performing, and writing more songs to connect with your hearts and spirits and the universe well into the future. ~ Lou Reed

I love Ornette Coleman. I love Don Cherry. I love the way those guys play. ~ Lou Reed

You won't see my parents honored on any stamps. ~ Lou Reed

I wanted to be an actor. That was my real goal. But I wasn't any good at it, so I wrote my own material and acted through that. That's my idea of fun. I get to be all these things in the songs. ~ Lou Reed

Partying means drinking. It also means playing records by Lou Reed and Chicago, which I thought was a city but is also a band it turns out. ~ Ron Currie Jr.

I don't believe in dressing up reality. I don't believe in using makeup to make things look smoother. ~ Lou Reed

Life is like Sanskrit read to a pony. ~ Lou Reed

I don't like categorizing stuff, but women's roles all through history have been to act as hierophant or someone who's guarded the secrets or guarded the temple. I'm a girl doing what guys usually did, the way that I look, the goals and kinds of things I want to help achieve through rock. It's more heroic stuff and heroic stuff has been traditionally male. Like Hendrix and Jim Morrison and all those people. I mean, Jim Morrison was trying to elevate the word; he was the poet in rock & roll before me. He was an academic poet. Lou Reed
another academic poet. I'm more like down-to-earth than them guys ~ Patti Smith

Music should come crashing out of your speakers and grab you, and the lyrics should challenge whatever preconceived notions that listener has. ~ Lou Reed

When he beat my mother it made me so mad. ~ Lou Reed

those were different times. ~ Lou Reed

I always believed that I have something important to say and I said it. ~ Lou Reed

It's fun to be in a small club and to be able to look somebody right in the eye and watch them just freak. Then it's fun to be in front of thousands of people and watch a couple of hundred freaking out of their minds. ~ Lou Reed

Lou Reed drove Honda scooters these days, and I was a hell of a lot closer to the wild side than him. ~ Warren Moore

Looking through the viewfinder for me is like being in a movie theater. That's what I like about it. ~ Lou Reed

Here comes Jesse Jackson, he talks of common ground. Does that common ground include me, or is it just a sound? ~ Lou Reed

There were lots of things that I recognized from my experience with Eagle Claw and Wu Hao, and here was the combination of the whole kit and kaboodle, the whole tamale in one. ~ Lou Reed

Speaking in a common tongue, speaking through guitars and drums. ~ Lou Reed

I don't like nostalgia unless it's mine. ~ Lou Reed

I dreamed that I was young and smart, and it was not a waste. I dreamed that there was a point of life, and to the human race. ~ Lou Reed

Jealousy endlessly eats through my mind, and jealously endlessly makes me be unkind. ~ Lou Reed

Writhe and sway to music's pain searing with asides, caress death with a lover's touch for it shall be your bride. ~ Lou Reed

When I saw that combination of grace and power, the fast and the soft, the yin and the yang, that's what I'd been looking for. ~ Lou Reed

And then I think of the Velvet Underground's doleful song "Jesus," from their third and least renowned or appreciated album. It is my favorite. "Jesus / Help me find my proper place / Help me in my weakness / 'Cause I'm falling out of grace." The only words in the song, repeated repeatedly, composed by Lou Reed, a Jew. You see, in the hour of darkness, it is easier to turn to the Son of God than to God Himself, for some reason. I'm not sure why. ~ Elizabeth Wurtzel

I can't do anything I want to. I mean, I can't have my own TV show. I can't have my own movie. But within my little world, nobody tells me what to put on the albums. ~ Lou Reed

I like mindless disco ... they say the lyrics are stupid and repetitious. So what's wrong with that? So is lying in the sun. Not everything has to be serious. ~ Lou Reed

But I'm also talented and I know when I created something great and Perfect Night is something great, no doubt, no but. ~ Lou Reed

You know, some people got no choice, and they can never find a voice, to talk with that they can even call their own. So the first thing that they see, that allows them the right to be, why they follow it, you know, it's called bad luck.. ~ Lou Reed

I've become completely well adjusted to being a cult figure. ~ Lou Reed

I don't know what goes on in the crowd. I've had them show up and throw beer cans at me. I caused riots in most of the major cities. ~ Lou Reed

I want the principles of a timeless muse, I want to eradicate my negative views. ~ Lou Reed

Families that live out in the suburbs often make each other cry. ~ Lou Reed