Paul Westerberg's Quotes

Oddly, when I started to make the record, I wasn't aware I was making a record. I just was sort of disgusted with the whole thing and sequestered myself in the basement and started playing the piano just for something to do.

Right now, it hasn't affected my music other than the fact that I don't have time to write any of it. That's no different from when I first started and I lived at home. I would play the guitar in the afternoon and then my mom or my dad would come home and I'd have to quit.

So I figured in keeping with the record, I'd do something off the wall which is show up for free and wing it... I don't know, I'm just going to play some songs. I think it'll be fun.

You know, he likes me because I'm his son. I have to go long and far to find someone who knows me just as me, rather than me the songwriter or whatever.

It's fun, but the fun is where it always was. I mean, it's still fun to strap on my Les Paul in the basement and turn up the Marshall amp. I'm still 15. I still enjoy that as much as I ever did.

The best I can say is that it's better for me to write about despair and darkness than to be incapable of getting off the sofa. It's better to write about suicide than to contemplate it too heavily.

I'm beyond caring what anyone expects of me anymore.

Reading music is like listening to flowers. I don't understand the concept.

A rock'n'roll band needs to be able to get under people's skin. You should be able to clear the room at the drop of a hat.

Any musician who can stop may be a musician, but they're no artist. If it's in your blood, it can't stop flowing.

I have my own language and it's high time I put a little of it out there.

I sat through Ladies and Gentlemen, the Rolling Stones like three times at the Skyway when it came out.

I think it should be evident by now, but I'm as lost as anyone.

I'm hard-pressed to think of a lot of great rock movies.

I'm not dissatisfied with my place in it rock 'n' roll.

It's like, it's up to the people to fall in love with the song. The record company can only do so much.

Stick with your heart and you'll be fine.

The hack songwriter will write the absolute truth every single word, whether it makes a great song or not.

The truth is overrated.

Then again, I think about high school every day and I think about being a little kid every day too.