Paul Westerberg Quotes

Any musician who can stop may be a musician, but they're no artist. If it's in your blood, it can't stop flowing.

I'm beyond caring what anyone expects of me anymore.

Right now, it hasn't affected my music other than the fact that I don't have time to write any of it. That's no different from when I first started and I lived at home. I would play the guitar in the afternoon and then my mom or my dad would come home and I'd have to quit.

Although, my experience when I've been depressed, not only am I too depressed to sit down and write a song, I'm too depressed to pick up my feet. So if you can at least write about it, you're halfway away from it.

I forever felt that I've fallen right between the crack of way too young for the first generation of classic rock 'n' roll and too old to be brand-new. It's hard.

The hack songwriter will write the absolute truth every single word, whether it makes a great song or not.

Stick with your heart and you'll be fine.

It's fun, but the fun is where it always was. I mean, it's still fun to strap on my Les Paul in the basement and turn up the Marshall amp. I'm still 15. I still enjoy that as much as I ever did.

I think it should be evident by now, but I'm as lost as anyone.

I'm hard-pressed to think of a lot of great rock movies.

The soul of rock 'n' roll is mistakes, and making mistakes work for you. The people who shy away from mistakes and play it safe have no business playing rock 'n' roll.

I've had more people in my life take their lives than... I think it's out of proportion with most people. I think a lot of them gravitate towards me because of the music.

I'm not dissatisfied with my place in it rock 'n' roll.

I didn't wake up one morning and not be in the Replacements. We're all that forever, and I've just grown older. I mean, I haven't lost anything. I've gained a few things.

Nobody gets married to a clever song, let alone falls in love to one.

There is that unpredictability of the seasons that I enjoy. I like the threat of a tornado. I like the threat of four feet of snow.

The truth is overrated.

A rock'n'roll band needs to be able to get under people's skin. You should be able to clear the room at the drop of a hat.

Reading music is like listening to flowers. I don't understand the concept.

Actually, I've done it the other way so many times where you rehearse the band and you do the whole thing with lights, the show and the crew - everything. Then you see what happens and you're already committed to dates. I'm just sort of putting out feelers this way.

It's like, it's up to the people to fall in love with the song. The record company can only do so much.

I think of the Replacements only when they're brought up to me. For two years, I'm at home, they don't really cross my mind. I still hear them on the radio. I'm not ashamed of anything we did.

The ones that love us least, are the ones we'll die to please.

People like to see human error when it’s honest. When people see you swing and miss, they start to root for you.

The best I can say is that it's better for me to write about despair and darkness than to be incapable of getting off the sofa. It's better to write about suicide than to contemplate it too heavily.

I try to write for highest common denominator. I don't write for dumb people. I figure if everybody doesn't get it, that's OK. Someone bright enough will get it, and that's who I write for. It's probably not the way to make million-sellers. What can I say? I won't apologize for trying to write for smart people.

Then again, I think about high school every day and I think about being a little kid every day too.