Top 102 Quotes & Sayings by Chrissie Hynde

Look, as long as we can make records and sell enough so we can do some shows, that's all I want. You know what? I just want to play guitar and be in a band. Same as I always did.

I did make a lot of my own clothes. I used to love to sew, so I made my own shirts and bell bottoms and modified my own clothes, which is what we did during the punk period.

I am very grateful to punk because I was a girl, and I felt like if I got in a band, I'd be kind of a novelty act, but punk was all about non-discrimination. No one cared because it was punk, so, you know, anyone could do anything they wanted.

I'm nothing without a band. I always feel like I'm part of the road crew until I'm on stage.

I don't know any guitar player, any of the real greats, who don't rate Joni Mitchell up there with the best of them.

I don't think that Michael Jackson died. He's probably dead now, but I don't think he died when they said he did. I think he wanted out of the game anyway, so he just disappeared.

I'll make music as long as I can sing and stand up and hold a guitar and I feel like doing this.

When I hear myself singing, I hear Iggy Pop and Jimi Hendrix. There's a conversational thing going on. I suppose it depends on which The Pretenders song you're listening to.

You're lucky if you find something that makes you feel like yourself; that's the one time that you feel like you know who you are. Most people are struggling to find that out all the time.

If you're an artist, you need to work. It doesn't matter how old you are, who you are. It doesn't matter if you're 12: if you draw, you draw. If you're 85 and you paint, you paint.

My heroes would never let me down; they never have. I've never been disappointed by any of them.

I just liked music, and I really liked rock guitar. I didn't think I was going to be a rock guitar player, because I was a girl. I would've been too shy to play with guys.

The so-called feminist writers were disgusted with me. I did my thing, and so I guess by feminist standards I'm a feminist. That suits me fine.

I used to think I was ordinary and just like everybody else, and I am, but there is something about being in a band. It's not for everyone.

I bought a Stella McCartney jacket in Salt Lake City. It's nice. It looks like a pea coat. I love Stella's stuff, so wherever I go in the world, I will always go in and buy her stuff.

Remember those black-and-white films with Frank Sinatra? Those guys looked like men and they were only 27! Listen to Otis Redding singing 'Try A Little Tenderness'. That was a man who understood what a man has to know in the world. Show me a real man now! Where are they?

I'm kind of a brown-rice hippy. I don't think I'd have much success if I tried a dinner party, but I'm not going to have one, and I've never been invited to one, and that's just fine.

I've done lots of songs for film soundtracks and things like that - stuff I'm not ashamed of, but that doesn't represent my legacy with the Pretenders.

I like Madonna a lot. I think she's really good, and I think she's a good singer.

For 35 years, I've said, 'I'll never go solo.' But after a period of time - and this isn't just for an artist, but for anybody - all the things you never wanted to do eventually become the only things left that you haven't done. So they start looking pretty interesting.

I can't force myself to do anything I don't wanna do, really. I never have.

A ballad once in a while doesn't go amiss.

I never want to bore the public.

All I can really remember doing was listening to the radio and listening to records when I was at school. I wasn't very academic, and I certainly wasn't a very good student.

I'm not a figurehead for anything. I was a single mom with two kids. What else was I going to do? It was either be in a band or be a waitress.

The only thing I've ever offered the public is some music. If they like the music, that's great. Turn on the radio. If they don't like it, switch it off.

Yeah, the industry has always been both the enemy and the best friend of the artist. They need each other. That's the bottom line.

I'm not a complete moron like most musicians whom I've met.

I don't think it's good to be sentimental, so I try not to be.

I don't know if I feel like an outsider or an insider; I just feel like I always did. I don't have one of those stories where I felt like no one understood me.

In this business, things go in waves, and I might make a record every three years. That's enough for me; that satisfies me. And it satisfies the so-called public, because they don't really need a record every year. They don't even want one.

All these fifty-year-old guys wearing baseball caps and shorts and acting like children. It winds me up. Men don't have to take responsibility anymore. Most of the guys I know would punch me on the nose for saying this, but maybe we do have to bring back conscription.

As far as success goes, I've never really got too excited about losing or winning.

My policy is to do the least amount to get by.

I'm mindful not to get too self-pitying or too revealing of my own pain.

I have no sense of patriotism, but I do have a sense of community.

In my experience lust only ever leads to misery. All that suspicion and jealousy and anguish it unleashes. I don't want those things in my life.

Music reflects the time that it's being made in, and so certainly, the music that's being made in 1986 by a 14-year-old kid will reflect some magic of 1986 for him if he's an inspired and creative musician.

Let's get rid of all the economic (expletive) this country represents! Bring it on, I hope the Muslims win!

Don't get a job in an abattoir. Don't be a butcher. The idea that people have to do these jobs for a livelihood is ridiculous. They can get other jobs. Shoplift, man. Better to be a prostitute than cut an animal's head off for a living.

The Clash were innovative, radical and helped drive a change in music that was ground-breaking. In comparison to some of the music today they sounded like they meant it. I still listen to their music today to remind myself what music made with commitment sounds like.

Real success is not being on the cover of a magazine; it's knowing that you've done, and enjoyed doing, what you set out to do.

I don't believe there is any justifiable reason for killing any animal unless perhaps if it's killing you! That would be negotiable.

For my 21st birthday, I think my mother wanted to give me a watch, or something, you know, some kind of traditional thing. And I said, "Well, if you're going to buy me something, there's a Gibson Melody Maker guitar advertised in the paper for 60 dollars. Do you think I could have that?" And I think that she was very disappointed that at 21 I was still messing around with that sort of thing. She didn't understand what it was all about. But now she understands it, and likes it.

Let's face it, we do have this mating instinct that just won't quit, you know? Just when you think it's safe to come out, there it is again. You're driving down the street, and it's the last thing on your mind, and all of a sudden you're like, "Oh, he looks nice," and you're up a lamppost.

I hope there is an edge to what I do.

I don't listen to music, and I don't particularly watch television, so if anyone wants to come over and just hang out with me sitting at the table in silence, you know, eating a dish of rice... I don't get too many takers.

I expect people to at least use some thought.

Once you stop drinking and smoking and stuff, it really gets on your nerves, all that nonsense going on.

The only person stopping you from doing something is yourself, and looking for excuses all the time just gets in the way of obtaining your own goals. It's like the writer who keeps getting up and straightening the pictures in the room.

How much did you get for your soul?

I just want to play guitar and be in a band. Same as I always did.

Being on tour sends me crazy, I drink too much and out comes the John Mcenroe in me.

What characterized the whole punk scene for me in 1977 was there was no racism or sexism. It was an anarchy of -isms, and a matter of abolishing it all.

Realize your own potential and try to live out your expectations of your potential.

I'm not going to judge what I do.

I preferred rock when it was in the dark, when it was a secret between me and the audience, when it wasn't mainstream.

The meat industry spends hundreds of millions of dollars lying to the public about their product. But no amount of false propaganda can sanitize meat. The facts are absolutely clear: Eating meat is bad for human health, catastrophic for the environment, and a living nightmare for animals

I was never too interested in high school. I mean, I never went to a dance, I never went out on a date, I never went steady. It became pretty awful for me. Except, of course, I could go see bands, and that was the kick. I used to go to Cleveland just to see any band. So I was in love a lot of the time, but mostly with guys in bands that I had never met. For me, knowing that Brian Jones was out there, and later that Iggy Pop was out there, made it kind of hard for me to get too interested in the guys that were around me. I had, uh, bigger things in mind.

Whatever I'm already doing becomes enhanced when I smoke pot. It can also be demotivating, because if I'm not doing anything and I smoke a joint, it enhances just sitting in a chair. Then I don't even want to get up to change a record. That might not be a bad thing, but you have to get things done once in a while.