Joe Perry Quotations

I love Indian food - it's my favourite cuisine. I love the mixture of spices and the subtle flavours. It's really erotic; the spices are so sensuous.

When I plug in my guitar and play it really loud, loud enough to deafen most people, that's my shot of adrenaline, and there's nothing like it. That's what it's always been for me - to be the flame the tribe dances around.

It seems ridiculous that you can be in one state with your driver's license and buy a firearm, and then in the next state it is totally illegal. There are real problems to that, but as soon as you bring up the subject and say 'gun control,' it sets a red flag.

I've been going long enough to prove what I wanted to prove, to get the girl I wanted to get, to make the money I wanted to make, to drink all the beer I wanted to drink. I've played - not exactly everywhere, but I've played enough places.

Take life on life's terms - one day at a time. And have fun while you're doing it.

I think people have to be more aware of what the repercussions are of their actions.

I'm turned off by the groupie thing. I'm a romantic; I like finding the right woman, and if it works, it works.

My Portuguese uncle had a Portuguese version of a ukulele. The family would pull it out after dinner and play Portuguese folk songs on it. I couldn't wait for him to finish so I could get my hands on it. I was seven or eight years old. And he used to have a Fender amp in his house and an electric guitar. I would spend hours making sounds.

I was very fascinated by the time when firearms went from being fire sticks to being something people could use to hunt and to survive.

I didn't think I could go onstage and play unless I had a beer to loosen up. Well, if it was only one beer to loosen up, I'd probably still be drinking today.

India brings out so many different feelings in me. I've been fascinated with India and Indian culture as long as I can remember - ever since the '60s with the Beatles and Maharishi Mahesh Yogi.

If you get satisfaction out of playing music and entertaining people and it makes you feel right, then go for it.

The Beatles had some juice when it came to distortion, but Clapton was finally able to break through those early studio engineers' fear of overloading. He defined the sound that guitarists spend the rest of their lives trying to get.

A band isn't a band unless they're playing together. Otherwise, it's just five guys that are living off their royalty checks.

Hopefully I'm bringing to rock n' roll the kind of spontaneity that I love, and always believed rock and roll stands for.

I've come to realize that you live on through recordings; they're like a musical diary, a window into somebody's soul.

Over the years, when you're in a band with a catalog like Aerosmith's, you accumulate a lot of instruments to duplicate those songs.

I'm a Republican, but I'm a Republican from the old school. I was taught that you get what you put into it. You can be anything you want to be if you work hard enough at it, and you can earn your place. That's the old way.

'Back In The Saddle' - I never realised what a good riff that was, or at least how much it satisfied me. And when we play it live, it comes across much better than I ever expected it to.

The Beatles just changed everything right across the board. They just had that right combination of clean-cut good looks - a cute band - but under that they had a real rock n roll thing going on.

Five years after Aerosmith got back together, I realized how fragile we are as humans. There was a time I thought we were bulletproof, but then things happened and I came to the realization that I had to play every gig as if it was my last show. You have to start thinking that way, because you never know what's going to happen next.

I collect firearms, and I've got a Winchester, an Indian rifle. It has tacks for every warrior that was shot, like notches on a pistol, and it's got feathers and beads hanging off it. It's like a work of art.

Some of the best rock riffs ever written were by Jimmy Page, and I can't really name the songs, but some of the stuff he did on his first and second records is beyond brilliant.

I think one of the most valuable things Aerosmith has is the energy we produce when we all play together.

When I got sober and started working out, I fell into that trap of working out too much. I know a lot of guys can relate to that - if you don't get that runner's high every day, you feel like, 'Oh my God, I'm losing it.'

When you can play in front of 3,000 fans, it's an opportunity to pull out some of the earlier and more esoteric songs.

When Tom Morello picks up the guitar, I'm sure what he sees is totally different from what I do, but I love the way he plays.

Maybe you could put it out there that I don't have a built-in dislike of ballads. That was kind of the reputation I had back in the Seventies. But I've come around. Ballads have become something of an acquired taste.

One of the best films made by Tim Burton.

I have always been fascinated with guns. I grew up in America, so, granted, it is part of our heritage, and it is written into the laws of how this country is run.

I felt in good form before the match and my confidence was high but I just do not seem to play well at that venue. I have never played Jimmy before but I am looking forward to it.

For years I've wanted to find some guys that I could work with, because I realized a long time ago that I can do a lot of things other than Aerosmith.

I don't spend much time listening to the records when they're done. Usually I let go of it. Especially in the Eighties and Nineties - they were like product, almost.

There aren't a lot of great bands out there that can put on a great rock show. They didn't come up in that environment, in that era before MTV where you really had to be a good live band.

There aren't a lot of great bands out there that can put on a great rock show, ... They didn't come up in that environment, in that era before MTV where you really had to be a good live band.

I think that after this game, it will make a difference the rest of the year.

L.A. was just an inspiring kind of place to be. It felt like going to Paris in the Twenties and Thirties. Everybody's there. Everybody's hanging around. Everybody's talking about music.

(Our music) doesn't sound dated, because there are so many new bands that are trying to replicate a '70s sound or a '60s sound. The playing field is getting kind of leveled. If you want to go out and see what a big rock show can be, we're there to do it.

Listening back to the tapes to make this record, it was just one of those nights. Usually when you put out a live record, you kind of cull them from a series of shows -- you get the best performance of each song and hone it down. But with that one, we just kind of let it fly.

That's what I love about music. It's immediate. There's a connection whether you are playing at Hyde Park or Chicago, and it's been happening since the beginning of time and the troubadours.

There are a lot of other kinds of acts and other things people can spend their money on now.

Whenever I hear somebody cover a song, I don't like to hear it stray too far from the original. I like to hear some of the new energy that a band will put into it, but you kind of want to hear some of the basic parts of the song. I mean, that's what makes it the song that you like.

This time it wasn't like I had some deadline or any agenda or was even thinking like that. This was an absolutely no-pressure situation, just an at-home project, totally different from any kind of record I've made before.

Y'know, I don't like jazz much. I'll put it on once in a while and listen, and I'll appreciate it.

We went back to the beginning of the band's career for some of these songs. We had fun knocking the dust off them but it was a little nerve-racking too, because we hadn't played some of the songs in a while. I think we've only played 'No More No More' live a total of 20 times in our entire career. We were going on muscle memory for some of these, which gave our performance an edge.

Every time I get in front of an audience, I do the best I can. I really don't look at it like, you know, 'This is gonna be this crowd, or that crowd.' If anything, I think about the demographics only because of what songs will entertain more than others.

There's something about it that still works. To draw on a sports analogy, there's a certain excitement that you get from watching that ball go in the hoop. That's still there, even though the sneakers are fancier.

There's no doubt arena shows are exciting, but you don't get that up close and personal kind of vibe, and that's what rock n' roll is all about for me.

I've been fascinated with all kinds of weapons my whole life, and as I have been able to afford to acquire pieces, here and there I started to collect.

I've been into guns ever since I was a little kid, and the ones that fascinate me most are the black powder guns that people used back in the 17 and 1800s.

I've seen bands split up for five years and do nothing. That sounds great to me, but it just hasn't worked out that way.

I've always felt you are only as good as your next album or next show. What you've done is done. When you get a gold record, you hang it on the wall, and then it's like, 'Yeah, next?'

Practice has gone well and I am really looking forward to Sheffield.

People spend their careers trying to figure out what makes a hit single. But I learned a long time ago that you can't anticipate what people want, because it's always going to change.

After a while, no matter how much you love any pop song, you're going to get tired of it. That's the way it is with any entertainment. It's good when you first hear it or see it, you like it for a while, then it gets old. It gets chewed up and spit out and it's done.

The bottom line is fans just want to hear a good song. Some people will look underneath to see who wrote it, but they just want to hear a good song. And if they don't hear it, they're not going to buy it just because you wrote it.

AC/DC is a prime example of taking that blues rock thing and just living in that world. They only really move the furniture around a little on each album, but it still works.

It's about just trying to top our last effort. We always feel like we're being chased. I look back at some of the records that we've done recently, and there's things about them that I like, and some that I don't. Those are the things that you lean on for inspiration.

For me, L.A. was, and is, a very creative place to be.

It's easy to put on a Deep Purple record and say, 'That sounds great.' But why? Part of it is individual practice, but by playing together, a talent of meshing happens.

It's so important for people to pay attention to history and learn from it, because it's the only thing we've got that's going to help us figure out where we are going. Especially the way things are manipulated in the press today. You have to sort through so much stuff to figure out what is real and what is not. It gets harder every day.

The kids get a vote. That's very important when it comes to raising kids. And always keep the bigger picture in mind.

I'm a fan first, and I don't believe good rock 'n' roll exists unless it's in partnership with the fans. By putting ramps up into the audience and keeping the stage low, it creates such an energy and an interaction with the crowd, it's a sum that's greater than the parts.

I'm sure we'll ease into it. I don't know if we're really contemplating that at this point. It's not going to be some big change. It's a gradual thing.

I really didn't like 'Done With Mirrors.' I really didn't like 'Just Push Play.' Then there are other records I really think were good for their time, like 'Toys and Rocks.'

If you want to attract people and income, you have to have a place for them to stay.

A lot of people don't listen to the albums. They just listen to the singles.

It's probably listening to country music that got me to start playing a lot cleaner, not as distorted.

The really pop country stuff can sound a little bland because they put in strings and horns and all of that.

There are guys in country music who are wizards on the guitar. If you're a country fan, you're used to it. But as a rock guitar player, you listen.

You can always pound out demos and send them to record companies, but most of the successful bands I've seen are the ones that can sustain themselves.

I think we're just a garage band that got lucky. It's the enthusiasm from the audience that keeps it going.

I don't need to speak...I play the guitar!

Rhythm and sex go together and that's where I come from as far as the music goes. Rag Doll and Love In An Elevator are such sexual songs that you put them on & the strippers go NUTS!

If you take your last album & try to copy it, then thats sure to hell the way to stagnation. And that makes me bored...and if I'm bored then the music is boring and so are the band!

Steven and I stood on the stage at the Boston Garden after the Stones had just played there and the stage was still up. We had been playing cards, maybe a high-school dance, to 400 or 500, maybe a thousand. We just stood on the stage and thought, 'Well,man,maybe someday.' In 4 years that was OUR stage.

I know that some of the great painters and some of the great artists didn't even start to 'peak', as you say, till they were in their fifties and sixties. And God knows, history is full of artistic people that weren't even recognized till they were dead and gone.

I think that... the age of just slapping songs into movies, that's done.

There are definitely things about 'Legendary Child' that echo the music we did earlier in our career. It's got the right stuff.

I love to listen to the music that first inspired me - I get that fresh feeling back.

Sometimes when a record's done, I'm satisfied and I won't listen back to it for a while 'cause I'm usually pretty tired of the songs. Then I've got to learn them again to play them live, and sometimes it takes a while to realise it's a really good record.

Aerosmith is such a powerful band; I mean, it's like a steam locomotive.

Describing certain sounds, there's a common language that guitar players have.

For me, L.A. was, and is, a very creative place to be.

I don't think there's anything anybody's doing that the Beatles didn't at least try at some point.

I have seen more bad songs make it because of MTV than good ones that haven't.

The media plays up celebrity a lot, but it doesn't hold a candle to being a scientist. There's a lot to be said for what they all do, and are trying to accomplish.

I never envisioned what I was doing as part of a career.

My chosen instrument is guitar and, fortunately, I'm able to muddle through that. I can play guitar to the point where I can express myself artistically.

Berry's On Top is probably my favorite record of all time; it defines rock and roll. A lot of people have done Chuck Berry songs, but to get that feel is really hard. It's the rock and roll thing-the push-pull and the rhythm of it.

The '70's came and went already

I know that the gift that God gave me isn't gonna just wither up and die unless I let it die, so it's a matter of me having the faith that it's gonna come out. Whether or not the public's gonna like it is another story. But I think as long as I keep changing and sticking to what I really love - and the same goes for Steven and the other guys in the band - then people are gonna like it.

I don't want fans to think we're clean, upstanding American boys, but we are Americans, and we do stand up.

The great British blues guitarists of the Sixties - people like Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck, Jimmy Page and Peter Green - could play like virtuosos, but they also understood the importance of energy and intensity

I think that's really important, that kids get exposed to music as soon as they can - not necessarily to become musicians, but at least have an outlet. It's an art form that's easily accessible to young ears.

I'm glad that I never ended up killing myself, though I came close more times than I would like to admit.

There was a time I thought I couldn't enjoy rock 'n' roll unless I had heroin in me

I guess we all have a bad night now and then and really screw up. I listened to our earlier stuff and we screwed up a lot. But at least now that we are sober, when we screw up it's for real.

Music is music you don't have to put a label on it

You think it's all written, but it's not. There's always another way to twist those three chords around.