I am writing better Stephen Sondheim songs than even Stephen Sondheim is writing.
If I were to have my own brand of guitars, they would have to be industructable.
I think we are incumbent, I am incumbent, the Who is incumbent, anybody that produces anything by me is incumbent by my Englishness.
I’m an air-conditioned gypsy.
It makes me angry when people insist that I have a responsibility to do what they think I should do.
It’s the most psychedelic experience I ever had, going to see Hendrix play. When he started to play, something changed: colors changed, everything changed.
The Who is now a brand, not a band; but it is a brand that is upheld by its audience, not an industry or a cynical moneymaking machine.
I am an animal, my teeth are sharp and my mouth is full, and the passion is strong.
Once she woke with untamed lover’s face between her legs, now he’s cooled and stifled and it’s she who has to beg.
Rough boys I wanna bite and kiss you.
Your love is like heroin.
Is your perception of ‘I Heard It Through the Grapevine’ so shallow that it’s violated by dancing raisins?
We won’t get fooled again!
No matter what happens in the future, rock and roll will save the world.
I have to say that anger is the blanket that comes around me, and that blunts and blurs my sense of proportion.
Early British pop was helped tremendously by the writing of Bob Dylan who had proved you could write about political and quite controversial subjects. Certainly what we did followed on from what was happening with the angry young men in the theatre.
I don’t really know any other musicians like me. I grew up backstage with my dad who played in a post-war dance band, so I always feel at home at a venue.
I just could not believe that 30 years later we’re still looking at people who are supposed to write little 2-minute pop that when they actually try to do something that’s a little bit more they regard it as pretentious.
It wasn’t just about flashing lights and pinball machines blowing up and things like that. It was about using encores, bringing back the good songs and using techniques that I knew about from rock performance.
If you don’t want anyone to know anything about you, don’t write anything.