“I'll tell you about punk rock: punk rock is a word used by dilettantes and, uh… and, uh… heartless manipulators, about music… that takes up the energies, and the bodies, and the hearts and the souls and the time and the minds, of young men, who give what they have to it, and give everything they have to it. And it's a… it's a term that's based on contempt; it's a term that's based on fashion, style, elitism, satanism, and, everything that's rotten about rock 'n' roll. I don't know Johnny Rotten.. but I'm sure, I'm sure he puts as much blood and sweat into what he does as Sigmund Freud did. You see, what, what sounds to you like a big load of trashy old noise… is in fact… the brilliant music of a genius… myself. And that music is so powerful, that it's quite beyond my control. And, ah… when I'm in the grips of it, I don't feel pleasure and I don't feel pain, either physically or emotionally. Do you understand what I'm talking about? Have you ever, have you ever felt like that? When you just, when you just, you couldn't feel anything, and you didn't want to either. You know, like that? Do you understand what I'm saying, sir?”

“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.”

“Punk's an attitude. Punk's not three-chord rock. If you want to listen to three chord rock, there's southern rock.”

“[On "grunge"] Music's music, and the weird thing is Brant [Bjork] has said this before; Soundgarden and those bands and Nirvana, those are great bands, but they did not create rock and roll. This whole "grunge" bullshit that everyone's talking about. "Oh my gosh, it's amazing!", they did not create rock and roll! It is rock and roll music. It's good rock and roll, that's all it is. They did not start something, they don't corner the market on anything. […] I think it's a shame, because it's a great media tool and it worked. Like, whoever thought of the word "grunge" should be rich by now because it's a great media trip, you know? But it's just all good rock and roll; Soundgarden, Nirvana, all these bands are just good rock and roll bands. People spend too much time categorizing what everything is. Just throw it on your turntable, throw it on you CD player or whatever you have and listen to it. Don't worry about what it is - no one cares, it doesn't matter anymore, you know? That's what should have happened, it shouldn't matter anymore what you are. There's so many, like, "fusion" everything and whatever that it shouldn't matter anymore, you know?”

“She gets rock n roll, a rock n roll station
And a rock n roll dream.
She's making movies on location.
She don't know what it means.
But the music make her wanna be the story.
And the story was whatever was the song, what it was.
Rollergirl don't worry.
D. J. plays the movies all night long.”

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

“I would say it was about time that you believe in something. And sex and drugs and rock 'n' roll ain't it…. A lot of people used to think they were.”

“Rock 'n' roll is an attitude, it's not a musical form of a strict sort. It's a way of doing things, of approaching things. Writing can be rock 'n' roll, or a movie can be rock 'n' roll. It's a way of living your life.”

“I'm gonna give her all my soul.
I'm gonna play her Rock 'N' Roll.”

“Hip-hop kind of absorbed rock, in terms of the attitude and the whole point of why rock was important music. Young people felt like rock music was theirs, from Elvis to the Beatles to the Ramones to Nirvana. This was theirs; it wasn’t their parents’. I think hip-hop became the musical style that embraces that mentality.”