Punk Revolution Quotes

Black Flag was formed in 1977. We first recorded in 1978.

I'm the first to admit that we were totally dependent on a particular place and time... for us, seeing Minor Threat at the CBGB hardcore matinee was just as necessary a force in our lives as the Treacherous Three at Club Negril or the Funky Four + One More at the Rock Lounge.

The Clash is pretty much my favorite band, and their songs like 'Rock the Casbah' are political dance tracks.

I remember ordering records out of the Dischord catalog in the '80s, and there would be a handwritten note.

The bands that were big in '77, like the Clash and the Sex Pistols and Talking Heads, I got into them in the early '80s. And it changed my life. It got into my DNA.

I think people are too hard on the Pistols. The Pistols started the whole punk thing and never saw much money.

The Ramones were inspiring a lot of bands that couldn't master their instruments.

The Sex Pistols came through Atlanta, and I got to go see them. That was historic. It blew me away; it was so much fun. I bought 45s of bands you don't hear about anymore.

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.

I can't sing that well, but when punk-rock came along, it changed all that.

Rock n' roll is over, don't you get it? It lasted 25 years and now gets wiped out. The Sex Pistols were the bullet in the brain. They were the last rock and roll band.

Green Day was more of the influence than Blink.

I saw the Clash in '79 at the Paramount in Seattle, and it changed my whole life.

I think punk rock needs an 'Amadeus.'

I created Punk for this day and age. Do you see Britney walking around wearing ties and singing punk? Hell no. That's what I do. I'm like a Sid Vicious for a new generation.

I was about 16 when punk started to happen. It was so exciting. You had a social depression going on in the U.K. There was a sanitation strike. London was really grim, gray. You had Margaret Thatcher coming in. It was a really revolutionary time.

The first time I heard 'White Man in Hammersmith Palais,' I loved the vulnerability in the music and the lyrics.

Well, I thought the Sex Pistols were the cream of the crop. They came in and topped everybody, for sure. They took all the existing strands and made a perfect package out of them.

It's really hard to imagine there ever being the kind of impact there was when punk rock happened in the late 70's. I wish there would be one big change like that again, but I don't know if that'll ever happen.

The whole punk scene is, of course, responsible for the Go-Go's ever getting created. Because before punk rock happened, you couldn't start a band if you didn't know how to play an instrument. But when punk happened it was like, 'Oh, it doesn't matter if you can play or not. Go ahead, make a band.' And that's exactly what the Go-Go's did.

I couldn't imagine a list of 10 records that didn't contain a punk record - that didn't contain a Clash record.

I always think the Sex Pistols and the Ramones as very, very important because they stripped things down.

People called me the godmother of punk, but I never name myself anything.

People always said that I hated punk, and that really wasn't true. It was glossed over for many years that I was the guy who found the Tubes and signed them to A&M. English punk was a revolution.