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Patti Smith

Patti Smith Quotes

Singer-songwriter

Patti Smith is an influential American singer-songwriter, born on December 30, 1946. Known for her unique musical style and poetic lyrics, she is considered one of the pioneers of post-punk and punk rock. Smith's music career began in the 1970s, and she quickly became a star in the underground music scene. Her debut album 'Horses' was released in 1975 and is considered a landmark in punk rock.

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Famous Patti Smith Quotes

“Everybody's got to reclaim these thingspoetry, rock'n'roll, political activismand it's got to be done over and over again. It's like eating: you can't say,'Oh, I ate yesterday'.You have to eat again.”

Done Political Rocks Eating Yesterday Rock N Roll Political Activism

Author:Patti Smith

“Punk rock is just another word for freedom.”

Rocks Punk Punk Rock

Author:Patti Smith

“As much as I can, as much as I can afford, I keep ticket prices down. Rock 'n' roll was developed as the people's voice, the people's art, it was grassroots. I don't believe that the people should be estranged from their rock stars. They're not kings and queens - all rock stars are those who are able to give back a bit of culture to other people. It's people's heritage.”

People Giving Should Believe Art I Can Able Culture Stars Bits Voice Rocks Kings Don't Believe Queens Heritage Rock N Roll Tickets Giving Back Rock Star Grassroots Kings And Queens

Author:Patti Smith

“Technology is 50% of rock 'n' roll - the magic, the art, the performance. If you don't have good technicians and a strong road crew who are devoted and believe in you and protect you, you're totally naked.”

Ifs Believe Art Strong Technology Magic Rocks Protect Performances Naked Rock N Roll Devoted Crew Believe In You Protect You Technicians

Author:Patti Smith

“I'm not really a musician. I'm a performer and I love rock 'n' roll.”

Rocks Musician Performers Rock N Roll

Author:Patti Smith

“I don't have an image of myself, when I'm walking down the street, like I'm a rock star or something. I'm a human being, I'm a friend, I'm a mom, I'm a writer, and I'm an artist. I do play electric guitar and all of that but in the end I'm just a person. I really don't live like a rock star, economically or socially. I still live a pretty simple life beside the traveling aspect of it.”

Humans Persons Stills Ends Play Artist Stars Human Beings Simple Streets Rocks Mom Walking Aspect Guitar Electric Rock Star Simple Life Electric Guitar

Author:Patti Smith

“I've embraced rock 'n' roll because it encompasses all the things I'm interested in: poetry, revolution, sexuality, political activism - all of these things can be found in rock 'n' roll. But I am also engaged in all of these things separately.”

Political Found Rocks Revolution Sexuality Activism Engaged Rock N Roll Political Activism

Author:Patti Smith

“New generations have unprecedented power to make great changes. Take the music business for example. The new generations have toppled the music industry by file sharing, downloading, and Myspace. Rock 'n' roll belongs to the people.”

People Generations Rocks Example Industry Rock N Roll Files Music Business Music Industry Unprecedented New Generation Great Change File Sharing

Author:Patti Smith

“I always wrote like rock 'n' roll. And I always listen to rock 'n' roll as poetry.”

Rocks Rock N Roll

Author:Patti Smith

“I like making records right now 'cause I can express myself that way in a very immediate, physical sense. You can always write a book, but you can't always do a rock 'n' roll record that's gonna work.”

Way Writing I Can Book Causes Records Rocks Right Now Rock N Roll

Author:Patti Smith

“When I started making music, we'd lost a lot of our great people. Rock was moving in a direction I didn't like. Rock was my generation's revolutionary, sexual, poetic, and political voice, but it had become corporatized. It was going into stadiums. It was so far removed from its basic roots.”

People Moving Political Lost Voice Generations Rocks Roots Revolutionary Poetic Great People My Generation Stadiums Moving In

Author:Patti Smith

“I'd try to write my poems in a certain rhythm. I had my rock 'n' roll stuff for performing and my denser stuff for writing.”

Writing Trying Certain Stuff Rocks Rhythm Performing Rock N Roll

Author:Patti Smith

“All the traumas I went through separating art from writing don't exist anymore. That's why I love being in rock 'n' roll. It's a whole life thing.”

Writing Art Whole Love Is Rocks Trauma Whole Life Rock N Roll Separating

Author:Patti Smith

“You're not a rock 'n' roll person four hours a day or even when you're on stage. It's become the rhythm of your whole life.”

Persons Whole Hours Four Rocks Stage Whole Life Rhythm Rock N Roll

Author:Patti Smith

“What I've always tried to do is to express the highest point of me, and rock 'n' roll is the first and the most open form created by our generation. The cool thing about it is that you get the power, you get the rhythm; you can be taken over sexually, you can be taken over cerebrally; it's great to look at - it's a package deal.”

Firsts Looks Form Deals Taken Generations Rocks Highest Rhythm Rock N Roll Packages Sexually Our Generation Cool Things

Author:Patti Smith

“I always hesitate when people call me a musician.I have had no musical training. I can't play anything. I really think of myself as a performer. It's always been writing for me. I evolved with my band in rock 'n' roll through poetry, not through music.”

People Thinking Writing I Can Play Rocks Band Musician Training Musical Call Me Performers Rock N Roll

Author:Patti Smith

“If you don't have what you need, just rock with what you've got!”

Ifs Needs Rocks

Author:Patti Smith

“Rock & roll is like a painting. Can great paintings still be done? It depends on who holds the brush.”

Stills Done Rocks Painting Depends Brushes

Author:Patti Smith

“My father hated rock and roll - hated it. My first real argument with my father was over the Rolling Stones. And he never, ever liked rock and roll. He just liked me.”

Firsts Real Father Rocks Argument Stones Hated Rolling Rock And Roll Rolling Stones

Author:Patti Smith

“My mother loved rock and roll. She loved high-energy music.”

Mother Energy Rocks Rock And Roll High Energy

Author:Patti Smith

“When I was a teenager, I dreamed of being an opera singer like Maria Callas or a jazz singer like June Christy or Chris Connor, or approaching songs with the kind of mystical lethargy of Billie Holiday, or championing the downtrodden like Lotte Lenya. But I never dreamed of singing in a rock-and-roll band.”

Kind Song Rocks Band Singing Jazz Singers Teenager Holiday Opera Rock And Roll Mystical June Lethargy Downtrodden Opera Singers Callas

Author:Patti Smith

“I wanted to remember the original energy; strip away all the glamour and limousines and tons of drugs. I wanted to get back to the revolutionary ideas, merging poetry and rhythm and rock and roll.”

Ideas Wanted Remember Energy Rocks Drug Originals Rhythm Revolutionary Get Back Rock And Roll Glamour Merging Revolutionary Ideas Limousines

Author:Patti Smith

“I'm old-fashioned. I think William Blake and people in the Renaissance people were multi. Look at da Vinci, he was involved in science; and Michelangelo was dabbling in poetry. Both of them were painters and sculptors but they also involved themselves with architecture. I honestly don't know what happened in the '60s and '70s. If you sang rock and roll in America at that time or were involved in expressing yourself through music like that, then many thought you couldn't possibly be an artist. That thinking is archaic.”

People Ifs Thinking Knows Looks America Artist Happened Rocks Involved Architecture Honestly Painter Rock And Roll Old Fashioned Express Yourself Renaissance Sculptors Blake Dabbling

Author:Patti Smith

“The best thing is to motivate people to do their own work. I'm not opposed to making money. But I started to play rock 'n' roll to motivate others, to shake things up, wake people up and to let other skinny, pimply marginalized weirdos know they're not alone.”

People Knows Play Rocks Making Money Best Things Shakes Rock N Roll Skinny Not Alone Weirdo Marginalized

Author:Patti Smith

“To me, punk rock is the freedom to create, freedom to be successful, freedom to not be successful, freedom to be who you are. It's freedom.”

Successful Rocks Who You Are Being Successful Punk Punk Rock Be Who You Are

Author:Patti Smith

“I came into music because I thought the presentation of poetry wasn't vibrant enough. So I merged improvised poetry with basic rock chords.”

Enough Rocks Chords Presentation

Author:Patti Smith

“Rock n' roll is dream soup, what's your brand?”

Dream Rocks Brands Rock N Roll Soup

Author:Patti Smith

“When I was younger, I felt it was my duty to wake people up. I thought poetry was asleep. I thought rock 'n' roll was asleep.”

People Felt Rocks Duty Wake Up Rock N Roll

Author:Patti Smith

“I was never a singer, I can't play any instruments, I had no training. Plus, I was brought up in a time when all the great rock stars were male. I didn't have any template for what I was doing. I did what I did out of frustration and concern.”

I Can Play Stars Rocks Training Concern Instruments Males Singers Frustration Plus Rock Star

Author:Patti Smith

“Music television is all about the media-oriented version of what it is to be a rock star; it's not about what Bob Dylan or Jimi Hendrix were about - which included great images, sure, but they had spiritual and political and revolutionary content, too.”

Spiritual Political Stars Rocks Media Television Versions Revolutionary Bob Dylan Rock Star Hendrix

Author:Patti Smith

“What I wanted to do in rock'n'roll was merge poetry with sonic scapes, and the two people who had contributed so much to that were Jimi Hendrix and Jim Morrison.”

People Two Wanted Rocks Rock N Roll Hendrix Scapes

Author:Patti Smith

“Why do people want to know exactly who I am? Am I a poet? Am I this or that? I've always made people wary. First they called me a rock poet. Then I was a poet that dabbled in rock. Then I was a rock person who dabbled in art.”

People Knows Want Firsts Persons Art Made Rocks Poet Who I Am

Author:Patti Smith

“We imagined ourselves as the Sons of Liberty with a mission to preserve, protect, and project the revolutionary spirit of rock and roll. We feared that the music which had given us sustenance was in danger of spiritual starvation. We feared it losing its sense of purpose, we feared it falling into fattened hands, we feared it floundering in a mire of spectacle, finance, and vapid technical complexity.”

Hands Spiritual Spirit Purpose Fall Given Liberty Rocks Danger Son Protect Projects Losing Missions Finance Preserves Revolutionary Complexity Rock And Roll Starvation Sustenance Vapid Floundering

Book:Just Kids

Source: Just Kids

“I immersed myself in books and rock 'n' roll, the adolescent salvation.”

Book Rocks Salvation Rock N Roll

Author:Patti Smith

“If I have any regrets, I could say that I'm sorry I wasn't a better writer or a better singer...When I was younger, I felt it was my duty to wake people up. I thought poetry was asleep. I thought rock 'n' roll was asleep...An artist may have burdens the ordinary citizen doesn't know, but the ordinary citizen has burdens that many artists never even touch.”

People Ifs Knows May Artist Felt Rocks Regret Duty Citizens Ordinary Sorry Burden Singers Songwriting Rock N Roll I'm Sorry Ordinary Citizens

Author:Patti Smith

About the Author

Born: December 30, 1946
Known for: Singer-songwriter
Quotes: 496

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Books & Sources

Just KidsRelated source material

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DevotionRelated source material

Patti Smith Collected Lyrics, 1970–2015Related source material

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