When punk rock came along, the one thing you were not supposed to be was musical.

When punk rock came along, the one thing you were not supposed to be was musical.

The number of contemporary artists who appeal to me is infinitesimal.

In the '70s, you had to come up with an album every year whether you were ready or not.

If a hit came along, I wouldn't be unhappy about that. But I'm a bit too old for that now-doing videos and all those types of TV shows. I've kind of done all that, in the '70s.

If anyone comes along, I'm more than happy to welcome them, but I'm not interested in world domination.

I like being a big fish in a small pond. I'm not interested in a huge audience because it brings headaches.

Be a military flier or be in a band; those were the two hippest things I could imagine.

As long as my body holds out, I'll be grooving when I'm 70, and not some sort of horrible spectacle.

All those years we'd spent learning these chops, and all those gigs in Germany where you'd play all night, and along comes punk. It has nothing to do with that. A lot of people went out of business.

I suppose I was waiting until I was old enough to have some sort of experience to sing about. When you're young, it's hard to sing the blues. Nobody believes you.

These days, rock 'n' roll is much more about rock than about roll. I don't do rock. But I'm interested in that roll part, because that's the funny little bit that makes it hip.

Elvis Costello had a brand new bag. He was a musician, but he knew all about the attitude part of it.

They tell me I produced songs. I just stood in the back, wore a good suit and said, Yeah, that's happening.

The world is full of musicians who can play great, and you wouldn't cross the road to see them. It's people who have this indefinable attitude that are the good ones.

I'm playing to the sort of people who like the same records.

You've got to really know your song, inside and out.

I work very hard on getting the songs as direct and examined as I can before I go in the studio.

Going to Nashville to meet the in-laws was the first time when I'd been in America and not been seen as some sort of eccentric character with a cute accent.

When somebody like Elvis Costello comes along, anybody can make a good record with him.

When punk rock came along, the one thing you were not supposed to be was musical.

I can play punk rock, and I love playing punk rock, but I was into every other style of music before I played punk rock.

Punk rock really came out of N.Y. as a philosophy before the groups were ever recorded. I had a kind-of intellectual interest in the idea of creating a new scene that could be a grassroots thing.

And I used to go the punk clubs such as a gay club in Poland Street that everyone would go to because it was the only place you could go to looking like that without getting beaten senseless.

Mozart was a punk, which people seem to forget. He was a naughty, naughty boy.

A punk concert isn't fun without a pit.

The first Decline I did was out of sheer love and appreciation for the music. In 1977, it was more about bands, because punk was a new form of music. It was groundbreaking and political.

When the punk thing came along and I heard my friends saying, I hate these people with the pins in their ears. I said, Thank God, something got their attention.

But there's actually a lot of punk bands out there that go out of the norm, use odd time signatures, or a lot of different tempo changes in a song.

The funniest thing happened in one of my first scenes. In the beginning Emma was really arrogant and punk and in every scene she would slam the door when she walked in or out.

There are several books out on punk history, but I haven't read any of them. I was there.

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

I got tired of the Ramones around the time I quit and I really got into rap. I thought it was the new punk rock. LL Cool J was my biggest idol.

The iconoclastic mode, that specific mode of language, there is an element of it that it is punk - that is confrontational. That's just a part of the language of jazz - at a certain point.

I was in a little punk band and we put out a few punk records that weren't very political, at all.

I didn't know who was on the team, but I saw every eye as I walked down the aisle. It looked like a thousand eyes were staring right at me saying, 'Who is this young punk?' I just kept my eyes straight ahead.

My dad took me to all the best rock and punk shows when I was growing up and music has always been a part of my life. So I'm very interested in the music scene and I suppose that's why I've ended up going out with musicians. Dave Pirner is still one of my best friends.

The new album is a childhood dream come true. Got to sing with Ronnie Spector, got to cover a bunch of songs that were influential in drawing a line between the punk form and original rock and roll.

Punk is not dead. Punk will only die when corporations can exploit and mass produce it.

Absolute 80's is three hours of mainstream 80's music. I also do New Wave Nation that is more cutting edge. It is more punk stuff from the 70's to the 90's.

There is a great deal of cyberpunk that I admire, especially the work of William Gibson which I think is excellent. Somehow he speaks from his own heart and cyber punk is what comes out.

Teachers didn't like me very much. They thought I was just this punk kid and they always wanted to kick me out.

I was the first person to have a punk rock hairstyle.

All those years we'd spent learning these chops, and all those gigs in Germany where you'd play all night, and along comes punk. It has nothing to do with that. A lot of people went out of business.

The last true punk band to get a major label contract was The Dickies.

I'm thinking of remaking Psycho again. Doing a third remake. The idea this time is to really change it - we're talking about doing a Punk rocker setting.

There are a lot of bands who claim to be punk and they only play the music, they have no clue what it's all about. It's a lifestyle. It's not about popularity and all that crap.

I'd been a Bowie fan before punk and used to get no end of trouble. I was always getting knocked about and having to run up the street, getting chased by people. It was horrible.

It's very cliched to go, 'You're not punk.' We don't care if we are, and we don't care if we aren't.