Music Quotes

That was a great period. We were like kings of the jungle then, and we were very close to the Stones.... I spent a lot of time with them, and it was great.

Paul [McCartney] and I made a deal when we were 15. There was never a legal deal between us, just a deal we made when we decided to write together that we put both our names on it, no matter what.

We're not Beatles to each other, you know. It's a joke to us. If we're going out the door of the hotel, we say, 'Right! Beatle John! Beatle George now! Come on, let's go!' We don't put on a false front or anything.

We were four guys... I met Paul, and said, 'You want to join me band?' Then George joined and then Ringo joined. We were just a band that made it very, very, big, that's all. Our best work was never recorded.

After Brian [Epstein] died, we collapsed. Paul took over and supposedly led us. But what is leading us, when we went round in circles? We broke up then. That was the disintegration.

That is one of the main reasons the Beatles ended. I can't speak for George, but I pretty damn well know we got fed up of being sidemen for Paul.

I meant it, it's real; the lyric is as good now as it was then. It's no different. And it makes me feel secure to know that I was that sensible, or whatever-not sensible, aware of myself... It was just me singing 'Help' and I meant it.

I think the music reflects the state that society's in. It doesn't suggest the state. I think poets, musicians, artists or whatever they are of the age, not only do they lead that age on but they reflect the age. And I think that's what the pop music is doing-it's mainly reflecting.

I'm a Loser,' 'Help,' 'Strawberry Fields,' they are all personal records. I always wrote about me when I could. I didn't really enjoy writing third person songs about people who lived in concrete flats and things like that. I like first person music. But because of my hang-ups and many other things; I would only now and then specifically write about me.

I write songs because that's the thing I chose to do. And I can't help writing them, that's a fact. Sometimes I felt as though you worked to justify your existence, but you don't; you work to exist, and vice versa, and that's it, really.

Just before I record, I go buy a few albums to see what people are doing. Whether they have improved any, or whether anything happened. And nothing's really happened. There's a lot of great guitarists and musicians around, but nothing's happening, you know.

If being an egomaniac means I believe in what I do and in my art or music, then in that respect you can call me that... I believe in what I do, and I'll say it.

People are afraid of Beatle music. They are still afraid of my songs. Because they got that big image thing: You can't do a Beatle number... You can't touch a Lennon song; only Lennon can do it... It's garbage! Anybody can do anything. A few people in the past have done Beatle songs. But in general they feel you can't touch them. And there are so many good singles that the Beatles wrote that were never released. Why don't people do them? It's good for me; it's good for Paul. It's good for all of us.

All music is rehash. There are only a few notes. Just variations on a theme. Try to tell the kids in the Seventies who were screaming to the Bee Gees that their music was just the Beatles redone. There is nothing wrong with the Bee Gees.

I think Mick [Jagger] got jealous. I was always very respectful about Mick and the Stones but he said a lot of tarty things about the Beatles, which I am hurt by. I'd like to just list what we did and what the Stones did two months after on every f***king album... he imitates us.

I've got used to the fact-just about- that whatever I do is going to be compared to the other Beatles. If I took up ballet dancing, my ballet dancing would be compared with Paul's bowling.

Carrying the Beatles or the '60s dream around all your life is like carrying the Second World War and Glenn Miller around. That's not to say you can't enjoy Glenn Miller or the Beatles, but to live in that dream is the twilight zone. It's not living now. It's an illusion.

Music is everybody's possession. It's only publishers who think that people own it.

Yeah we all shine on, like the moon, and the stars, and the sun.

If you tried to give rock and roll another name, you might call it 'Chuck Berry'.