My ambition was to be a record producer, and I had started doing that in the late '60s with my work with the MC5 and my friend Livingston Taylor.

The Beatles never sounded intimidated by their idols. They never interpreted old rock; they simply played it as well and as joyfully as they knew how. On 'Rock 'n' Roll,' John Lennon does nothing but interpret old rock.

As a performing group, the Beatles began by playing old rock favorites, for dancing, to tough audiences in Liverpool and Hamburg. When they began writing seriously, they discovered that they couldn't compose in the early American rock tradition.

Ringo Starr may not have much of a voice, but when he sang a song on a Beatle album, it had its own special charm.

The greatness of Mac Rebennack, alias, Dr. John, also known as John Crieux, rests on his command of the musical use of idiomatic expression. Not a technically well-endowed singer, nor a great songwriter, he leaves his mark through the discipline and control he exerts over all that he touches.

The Stones were always exemplary of one of the best of all rock qualities: tightness. They have always been economical, the opposite of ornamental. Having a very clear idea of what they wanted to say they could go into a studio and make it all up on a three minute cut.

While the Beatles always had George Martin around to clean up their act, the Rolling Stones had Andrew Loog Oldham to coarsen theirs.