I was in a choir as a kid. It was from those early days that my outlook on harmonies and arrangements were nurtured. I always took that with me, even on the earliest Bad Religion record, which strangely was only about six years after that.
If you've followed us from when we started playing live in October 2010, you will notice that there has been numerous changes over the years.
When we signed our deal in 1974, we'd already been together for six years. When they lowered the drinking age in Ontario in 1971 to 18 years, we went from playing two or three high schools in a month to playing clubs two or three times a week.
I saw Kiss on 'The Dick Clark Show' in, like, 1980 or something, and 'Kiss Alive!' was the first record of theirs I had.
The Band never really played big concert tours. We never sold millions and millions of albums.
When Patrick finally broke his silence with 2008's 'Anthems For the Damned' - the first Filter album that he recorded sober - fans were decidedly lukewarm.
I think people forget even though we were labelled a synth band because of 'The Hurting,' but keyboards are not our native instruments. Roland's a guitar player and I'm a bass player.
When I look back at the span that Mr. Big lasted, we had some unbelievable times. But there were grueling times, too.
Anyone who knows the history of the Pete Best Band or the Combo, we were on the verge of breaking in in America. In the mid-'60s, I had great songwriters; we wrote some great stuff.
My first band, we wanted to be like Foreigner and Journey.
'Boy,' 'October,' 'War,' 'The Unforgettable Fire' and 'The Joshua Tree,' those records, they're part of my musical DNA and structure.
There was no animosity in the breakup of Soundgarden.
I was one of the original drummers. What everyone likes to do is think of Lynyrd Skynyrd as the band that picked up again in '73. But I was one of the original members, and I was a big part of that.
I always say, 'Hey, I'm in Metallica, but I wasn't on the Black Album.'
New Order never celebrated anything to do with Joy Division.
Oasis can't be summed up in one word. I could do a sentence: Boys from council estate made it very, very big.
The early Bon Jovi stuff I can't stand. I just think we didn't have our stylistic voice. But some people love some of that stuff.
The name 'The Beach Boys' is controlled by Brother Records Inc., which was founded by the original members of the Beach Boys and whose sole shareholders voted over a decade ago to grant me an exclusive license to tour as 'The Beach Boys.' With it, I've felt a great responsibility to uphold, honor and further our legacy.
There are definite reference points to older Depeche Mode records.
When I was still in the Yardbirds, our producer, Mickie Most, would always try to get us to record all these horrible songs. During one session, we recorded 'Ten Little Indians,' an extremely silly song that featured a truly awful brass arrangement.
Anyone who's followed our band through the years has heard about the teenage angst.
We started off as a garage band who played a lot of rock 'n' roll.
One thing a lot of people don't know about Fun. was that the three of us all came from 10 years of touring with our own projects. That's how we met, actually.
Nikki lives around the corner from me and I see him all the time. We talk a lot, and of course we're still friends. That was our baby, Motley Crue, we put that band together.
We've been around about 20 years and we only have, what, two records? We're not terribly prolific.
