Ian MacKaye Quotes
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With Napster and the sharing of music, of course, there are going to be people who exploit it. Greed has no end. But there's a lot of good that could happen. We shouldn't let the economic concerns of the major labels infringe on our freedom to share music.
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You had bands like D.O.A., or Black Flag, and a whole network opened up to trailblazer a counter culture movement. I'm more interested in the less sensational type of stories.
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Now anyone can move anywhere. I've made deep connections with people around the world since I tour everywhere that I will simply never see again.
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Ultimately, if circumstances line-up in a way that makes it possible for Fugazi to play and the desire was there, we would do that.
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An unlocked door means that, occasionally, you might get a devil come in, but a locked door means you have thousands of angels just walk by.
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Bars are meeting places and places to unwind. But at some point, what is culture unwinding from, and why can't they meet anywhere else?
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My focus is always on the day. What I've done behind me, I try to have respect for it, and keep an eye on it, and make sure it isn't abused, and obviously be thoughtful about it, because it's all real to me. I'm basically in every band I ever was in, and the songs, I still mean them all.
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I do feel like I have always, in my life, been inclined to be on the outside, walk a different path or something. Because of that, and increasingly over the years, my sense of distance from mainstream society or from the way culture works, I have a different kind of perception of it.
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I never imagine myself as anything. I've never had a goal or any future vision at all. I just do what's in front of me.
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Archiving is extremely expensive and time consuming. I'm sure an archivist would tell me I'm doing it wrong. It's an industry that's built upon essential ideas, and some of those practices are abusive.
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What I find interesting as a 40-year-old is the idea of trying to be a part of a pronounced, continuing independent culture. The basic tenet of America is that you rebel and then you get real.
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Trenchmouth, really great band. Here's a photo of them in 1979 playing the Valley Green projects. It was an incredible, unusual experience. We ran a cord through the window and plugged the PA and amps into that and played right in the courtyard. It was an incredible experience. It was just local kids.
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When people who are songwriters say 'That's my property and if you give it away for free then I'll lose my incentive,' then, well, good riddance.
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And in fact, one of the central reasons why I never got involved with any drugs or anything is that I remember talking to people in maybe 1975 who saw Hendrix but couldn't remember it. I was like, 'How could that be?'
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Structures can be manipulated for ill as well, especially when people are dealing with issues of power, or control, or violence.
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"Straight Edge" was a song about my life. There was no structure, no premise as if I was forming a club. There were no tenets. I mean I wrote a song called "Straight Edge," I'll take that, but the song was about my life the way I wanted to live it.
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I don't think it's an ethical or moral issue, or even that people are stupid, but I do feel like as a culture things are out of balance, perverted, and inverted. Things that are ridiculous are worshipped, and things that are important are ridiculed. I think that's something worth thinking about.
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My point of view is, I'm just a person, and there are times when I look at other people and think, 'My God, they spend so much time thinking about things that seem so absurd.' But I'm sure people must think the same thing about me.
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The Corcoran show was actually almost a reportage. The exhibit was, in many ways, pretty unique. It was one of the first pieces about DC culture that doesn't include some marble building or the Kennedy Center.
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When someone writes a really nasty piece about me. I think they're generally untrue because I think I'm a nice person.
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It's just hard to have a nuanced discussion with like a thousand people, 30 of which are white-power skinheads.
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There are certainly good examples of incredibly brilliant, beautiful music that has been made commercially available and sold everywhere. But I would say that, for the most part, quantity certainly does not speak well for quality.
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There's also a lot of skateboard stuff, because I was a skateboarder. Somewhere around here I have one of my original boards.
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It makes me sad, the way human beings talk smack. It's why I don't like irony. People are too gleeful to put some teeth into something.