Quotes By Lou Reed

There's a bit of magic in everything, and some loss to even things out.

I think it's pretentious to create art just for the sake of stroking the artists ego.

There's only X amount of time. You can do whatever you want with that time. It's your time.

Take a walk on the wild side.

I tried to give up drugs by drinking.

But I'm also talented and I know when I created something great and Perfect Night is something great, no doubt, no but.

Perfect Night is minimalistic and that's what makes it so forceful.

The first generation of CDs sounded terrible. Any chance to remaster would make the music sound better than what was already out there.

You can't beat 2 guitars, bass, and drums.

I don't like the word rock opera, but I'm trying to write on that level that's reserved for plays still, or novels.

One chord is fine. Two chords are pushing it. Three chords and you're into jazz.

In the late '70s I started to search for the perfect sound - whatever that might be, before that I was mainly interested in drugs, insanity and the rock'n'roll lifestyle.

Perfect Night has that magic and it has the raw energy that grabs you by the throat.

I don't think I'm in any position to call myself a martial artist. I'm a student of the martial arts.

My God is rock'n'roll.

Music was what bothered me, what interested me.

I'm an artist and that means I can be as egotistical as I want to be.

How can anybody learn anything from an artwork when the piece of art only reflects the vanity of the artist and not reality?

I can't do anything I want to. I mean, I can't have my own TV show. I can't have my own movie. But within my little world, nobody tells me what to put on the albums.

These are really terribly rough times, and we really should try to be as nice to each other as possible.

Some even claim that I'm a terror, a dictator and they're right.

I always believed that I have something important to say and I said it.

You're a musician: You play. That's what you do.

The music is all. People should die for it. People are dying for everything else, so why not the music?

Raymond Chandler managed to write about L.A. his whole career. Should I keep going writing about New York? Is that what I should be doing? Songwriting doesn't work that way.

I don't like nostalgia unless it's mine.

I'm too old to do things by half.

I don't mind a repetitive chorus; I mind repetitive verse. I mean, it's the same amount of space. Why would you have only three diamonds if you can have six?

I don't know what goes on in the crowd. I've had them show up and throw beer cans at me. I caused riots in most of the major cities.

One of my rules is: Never listen to your old stuff.