Musician Quotes

I talk to people who are musicians, and they go, Oh this is hell. And I go, Are you kidding me? You never put tar paper on a roof, did ya?

I still don't know if I'm good enough or if it's a calling or a vocation or something, but the talent part is out. My desire to do it is undoubted. I just love doing this.

'Yield' was completed in 1997 and released in 1998. In the spring of 1997, I had made a decision to stop taking medications that I had been taking daily since 1988.

We were playing a small club in San Diego and the power had gone out in the building. Eddie had a lighter and kept us lit backstage. We became very good friends and spent a lot of time together including hearing Eddie sing in some of the bands he was in at the time.

We got a chance to go and play in some places that the usual European tour by an American band didn't go to.

We completed and released 'No Code' in 1996. We began some off and on touring for that release.

It was about this time that I began experiencing the beginnings of my battles with an anxiety disorder. We were touring a lot and there were some developing personal problems within the band.

In January of 1995, my family and I moved to Seattle. Pearl Jam did the first of their live radio broadcasts, Monkey Wrench Radio, along with many other Seattle musicians.

I remember wearing overcoats, hiding in the bushes outside of Abbey Road Studios, waiting for the traffic to clear. As it did, we would drop our overcoats and run out on to the cross walk and strike our poses.

I remember a tour where we played 50 cities in 56 days. We also went to Europe a couple of times.

I had wanted to play drums since the age of 9 when I saw a drum set in the window of a music store for the first time. We took lessons at a local music school and began playing together after about 6-9 months of lessons.

I finished the recordings I had started with Eleven. Matt Cameron joined for the rest of those sessions.

I could not finish the rest of the tours the band had planned. I was replaced by Matt Cameron. The next years of my life were about recovery, healing, and right living. I never lost the need to create.

I began the process of recording myself seriously in the fall of 1999. If I could finish an album of my own music, I would. Five years later I am happy to say I have.

I began hearing rumors of apossible recording session with Neil Young. I was a huge fan of Neil's.

I began both auditioning with Pearl Jam and recording for Eleven. In the fall of 1994, I joined Pearl Jam.

After wrestling with myself for six months, I began medical treatment. During that time I started a band with some friends of mine called Jack's Car, but that didn't last.

I've always thought of myself as being extremely lucky. The idea is to keep that luck going. Headlining the Stanley was a real kick. I think it's the type of thing I could get used to.

I think getting the rest of the guys in the band to write is important.

I get a lot of inspiration from the audience feedback to our live shows.

My early influences were the Shadows, who were an English instrumental band. They basically got me into playing and later on I got into blues and jazz players. I liked Clapton when he was with John Mayall. I really liked that period.

I was mostly surprised by the rap artists, actually, that were influenced by Sabbath. That was a surprise. But it's very nice and I'm very honored. It's nice to know after 27 years now that what I said in the first place has stuck, and that was the belief in it.

I hated school. After 15, you went off to college if you were good enough. It didn't appeal to me so I left school. I did what everybody did - get a job.

For me, I've never talked about my private life. It's always been about Black Sabbath. It's strange to open up and talk about me as a young lad, my relationships, marriages and what not.

In the past, I'd sort of know before Ozzy sang something, what he was going to sing. I'd know what sort of way a melody was going to go 'cause of the way he'd approach it.

Like most things that happen with Sabbath, it happened all of a sudden. I was intending on doing some recording, but out of the blue, Sharon called up and said she wanted us to do these gigs with Ozzy. I said that if everybody else was up to it then I would love to do it.

I'm not a nightclub person, but you need to have a social life sometimes.

I'm a perfectionist.

I'm a fan of homeopathy, acupuncture and spiritual healing. In Australia, this is not weird, but when I arrived in the U.K., everyone thought I was a freak.

I would have been happy to have waited till I was in my mid- to late-30s before I got married, but you don't choose when these things happen, and when they do, there's no doubt in your mind.