Patti Smith Quotes
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Artists are traditionally resistant to labels.
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My mother and father had so many ups and downs and stayed with each other and helped each other. My mother took in ironing and she was a waitress. My father was working in the factory and he did people's tax returns.
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I'm an intuitive musician. I have no real technical skills. I can only play six chords on the guitar.
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I was so unhealthy as a child, and at least three or four times my parents were told to get ready, that I would not make it.
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I know what that tastes like, to be a rock-and-roll star - to have a limousine, to have girls screaming when they see you, girls trying to cut my hair, get a piece of me. But I don't walk around with a concept of myself as a rock-and-roll star, and certainly not as a musician, because I really can't play anything, except primitively.
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Besides me wanting to be an artist, I wanted to be a movie star.
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Life is filled with holesJohnny's laying there in his sperm coffinThe angel looks down at him and says 'Oh, pretty boyCan't you show me nothing but surrender?
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For Christmas every year, my mother used to give me those cheap little diaries that would tell your horoscope and provide a little blank slot for each day.
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I am not really certain how original my contribution to music is as I am obviously an amateur.
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My father was a dreamy fellow - he read Plato and Socrates and watched Phillies games.
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C'mon, I mean who didn't listen to 'The Who' in the 60s?
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My style says, 'Look at me, don't look at me.'
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Americans just don't know what being a movie star's all about.
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I haven't had the most thrilling lifestyle. I was a pretty good dresser, but I would have a pretty boring 'Behind the Music.'
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I'm a worker. I do the work to communicate, and I want people to embrace it, and when they do I'm happy.
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I've always believed in having a sense of balance and stealth.
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I voted for Obama. I was very happy when he won. But Obama hasn't really been able to effectively do anything that has made me... He hasn't helped the environment. He didn't close Guantanamo Bay. He went deeper into Afghanistan.
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I learned a lot from Arthur Rimbaud. People talk about how he wanted to be a seer and do that through the derangement of the senses. What they forget was that he also advocated, sternly and austerely, that one must be able to go through all that - and then articulate it.
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I don't stay in one discipline because it's more lucrative than another. In fact, the most successful thing I ever did was 'Just Kids,' for which I had absolutely no expectations.
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Nothing will stifle your human evolution more than fame and fortune.
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Music television is all about the media-oriented version of what it is to be a rock star; it's not about what Bob Dylan or Jimi Hendrix were about - which included great images, sure, but they had spiritual and political and revolutionary content, too.
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As a citizen, hopefully I'm humanist. As an artist, I'm free.
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Nothing is a hobby - each discipline is its own world with its own high standards. Of course, every artist has 'minor works' that they do, but I don't think I have any 'minor disciplines.'
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When I was young, I was offered my first recording contract in 1971 and was offered quite a bit of money if I would change my character and be a '70s version of Cher.