Punk Quotes

• 

  Rap music is the only vital form of music introduced since punk rock.

  Kurt Cobain

  Rap, Rocks, Form

  M.E.A.T Magazine, September 1991.

  55 Copy quote

  Show source

• 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.

  Patti Smith

  Successful, Rocks, Be Who You Are

  46 Copy quote

• 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.

  Avril Lavigne

  Motivational, Birthday, Walking Away

  "Blitzkrieg Bot: Watch Some Robots Cover The Ramones" by Josh Kurp, uproxx.com. February 27, 2013.

  42 Copy quote

  Show source

• Punk is not just the sound, the music. Punk is a lifestyle.

  Billie Joe Armstrong

  Sound, Lifestyle, Punk Music

  18 Copy quote

• We don't want to act like adults. Anybody who can stay in a state of adolescence will be much better off later on. Look at people who are working nine-to-five jobs out of college, and look at professional skateboarders or guys in punk bands. See who's having more fun.

  Tom DeLonge

  Jobs, Fun, College

  53 Copy quote

• There are a lot of bands who claim to be punk and they only play the music, they have no clue what it's all about. It's a lifestyle. It's not about popularity and all that crap.

  Billie Joe Armstrong

  Play, Band, Clue

  16 Copy quote

• The whole punk ethic was do-it-yourself, and I've always been very literal, especially as a kid. When they said that anybody can do this, I was like, 'OK, that's me.'

  Michael Stipe

  Kids, Ethics, Said

  9 Copy quote

• If I like hardcore straight-edge punk music, gentle psychedelic folk music, gangster rap, indie-rock with a lot of guitar pedals, and I find inspiration from all these things in different songs of mine, shouldn't I be allowed to make any of this kind of music that I want? And it's the same for the comic books, why should I only make autobiographical stories? Or only political stories? Or only superhero stories? Or only comedy stories? I am a bit creatively desperate, when I sit with a pen and paper I am desperate for ANY idea that makes me excited, I don't care what kind of idea it is!

  Jeffrey Lewis

  Song, Inspiration, Rap

  Source: therumpus.net

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• Punk is musical freedom. It's saying, doing and playing what you want. In Webster's terms, 'nirvana' means freedom from pain, suffering and the external world, and that's pretty close to my definition of Punk Rock.

  Kurt Cobain

  Pain, Mean, Rocks

  67 Copy quote

• Punk is not dead. Punk will only die when corporations can exploit and mass produce it.

  Jello Biafra

  Corporations, Produce, Mass

  44 Copy quote

• We are living in a world in which we don't give the young enough reason to live. The temper and the lyrics of a lot of punk music and so on is very, life sucks and then you die, sort of theory. I feel life is cheaper and death is more attractive now than it was when I was an adolescent, as I remember. Suicide was a personal pathology when it was committed. There was no society approval of it, like there certainly is in Palestine and some quarters of Iraq.

  John Updike

  Suicide, Life Sucks, Giving

  Source: www.today.com

  7 Copy quote

  Show source

• People ask me: ‘What is punk? How do you define punk?' Here's how I define punk: It's a free space. It could be called jazz. It could be called hip-hop. It could be called blues, or rock, or beat. It could be called techno. It's just a new idea. For me, it was punk rock. That was my entrance to this idea of the new ideas being able to be presented in an environment that wasn't being dictated by a profit motive.

  Ian MacKaye

  Rocks, Ideas, Space

  30 Copy quote

• I come from the home-grown punk ethic, where it doesn't matter if you can't play a note, it's how you communicate.

  Siobhan Fahey

  Home, Play, Matter

  7 Copy quote

• A guy walks up to me and asks, "What's Punk?". So I kick over a garbage can and say. "That's punk!". So he kicks over the garbage can and says, "That's Punk?", and I say, "No that's trendy!

  Billie Joe Armstrong

  Garbage Cans, Guy, Trendy

  "Green Day: Keeping Their Edge". Book by Matt Doeden (p. 23), 2006.

  14 Copy quote

  Show source

• To me, the punk rock kids I grew up with were really, really smart, and to me, respecting those kids was a really big deal.

  Matthew Lillard

  Smart, Kids, Rocks

  "Matthew Lillard Does Punk Proud". Interview with Niki Cruz, www.interviewmagazine.com. November 6, 2012.

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• Punk gave me the strength to think, "Yeah, you can stand up and be counted, and do what you want in life, and not be hoodwinked by it all," in a simple, very general sweeping way.

  Steve Diggle

  Simple, Thinking, Want

  Source: pitchfork.com

  8 Copy quote

  Show source

• I know what you're thinking. Did he fire six shots or only five? Well, to tell you the truth, in all this excitement, I've kinda lost track myself. But being as this is a .44 magnum, the most powerful handgun in the world, and would blow your head clean off, you've got to ask yourself one question: "Do I feel lucky?" Well, do ya, punk?

  Clint Eastwood

  Movie, Powerful, Thinking

  8 Copy quote

• Punk was originally about creating new, important, energetic music that would hopefully threaten the status quo and the stupidity of the 1970s.

  Jello Biafra

  Creating, Stupidity, Important

  Interview with John Krewson, www.avclub.com. April 9, 1997.

  7 Copy quote

  Show source

• If Nirvana had remained a small, underground punk rock band, Kurt Cobain would still be alive. And he'd probably be living in Seattle, getting kind of fat and balding, be relatively happy and producing records for other people.

  Moby

  Rocks, People, Band

  8 Copy quote

• This isn't CM Punk talking to Triple H, this is Phil Brooks talking to
  Paul Levesque

  CM Punk

  Talking, Wwe, Cm Punk

  11 Copy quote

• The thing about punk is that there are purists. Once you start going outside of that, they don't think what you're doing is punk rock.

  Billie Joe Armstrong

  Thinking, Rocks, Punk Rock

  23 Copy quote

• I don't think punk ever really dies, because punk rock attitude can never die.

  Billy Idol

  Attitude, Thinking, Rocks

  "Biography / Personal Quotes". www.imdb.com.

  14 Copy quote

  Show source

• Don't let these tattoos fool you. I'm straight edge. I'm a man of great discipline; I don't drink, I don't smoke, I don't do drugs... my addiction is wrestling - my obsession is competition. Discipline. My name is C...M...Punk.

  CM Punk

  Inspiring, Tattoo, Wrestling

  "Extreme Championship Wrestling", July 4, 2006.

  52 Copy quote

  Show source

• What we get in punk these days are layers of 'anti-', and so many of them are so self-serving. It's not about larger freedom.

  Geoff Rickly

  Self, Layers, These Days

  Source: pitchfork.com

  6 Copy quote

  Show source

• I've always been spiritual but I've never had a proper context, and it took me awhile to find the proper context. It's hard to realize you can have any kind of relationship with God you want...and so I now have a punk rock relationship with God.

  Billy Corgan

  Spiritual, Rocks, Want

  Interview with Julianne Escobedo Shepherd, pitchfork.com. June 12, 2005.

  15 Copy quote

  Show source