Top 93 Quotes & Sayings by John Waite
Explore popular quotes and sayings by an English musician John Waite.
Last updated on April 14, 2025.
Marty Robbins was one of the first singers that really hit me hard.
My brother was the first in Lancaster to have a Fender Stratocaster.
So much of your life is wrapped up in the songs. All the twists come back, and you go back to that place when you were singing it. It's like reading your own diary and being in a time machine.
I've never had a plan.
We'll just tour til we drop; at certain times in your life, that's the only answer.
There's an easy way to tell if you have a good song. You get hit in the head with a message, and you get hit in the feet with a rhythm. You're beaten up with music. It's a beautiful thing when that happens.
I just tried to disappear and write songs.
I mean, I hate to say it, but I listen to Journey and think, 'Jesus Christ, that is just wrong.' That's why there will never be a Bad English reunion. It's for super white people listening to super white music.
I tend to scribble down notes, lyrics or just random thoughts on pieces of paper, backs of cigarette packs, sometimes on my shirt cuff.
Songs, and songwriting keeps me inspired, moving forward.
When I think of a song, I think of it as a beast. You chase these beasts around the room and try to grab them and put them in a tape machine. But they're slippery, and they run away a lot.
There's a lot of compromises, but that's what a great record should be, really.
Rock seems a little bit redundant now because it really is what country is. It's the voice of America and rock 'n' roll used to be that.
My heart's in New York City. But you can't live that pace forever.
Rock n' roll is closest thing I've got to a spiritual power. It's been the higher voice in my life and it's never let me down.
Coming off the back of the live album, there was a certain edginess and an almost punk energy that I've missed for a while.
I think rock 'n' roll is very visual. All of the best bands, like The Stones, The Who and Small Faces, were very valid both musically and visually.
People wanted to know where I was and what I was doing. Was I still recording? Was I touring? Was I putting a band together? Was I writing songs? Was I even still singing?
You know, I still find music as inspiring and exciting as I did when I was 15.
I don't even have any of my gold records on my walls at home. They're all in storage.
I booked time in Philly Sound, which is an old church in south Philly that has a studio to the side of it that holds about 350 people. On the radio, we announced a free gig, bought about three kegs of beer. That got the audience slightly off of their legs, and we rocked the house.
Music can have a real timeless quality - and, really, it's all about energy.
I mean, I really hung in there for as long as I could. I was working 18 hours a day on songs and singing.
But I'll never write another Missing You' again as long as I live. I hope that I'll write a good song, but I don't think that I'll be able to write another song that will reach people that much.
It' always so sad to see people spend the rest of their careers just trying to repeat the formula.
If something feels right, then just do it.
Flying is so miserable these days. You have to go through security, and get up at the crack of dawn.
The Babys - all their biggest hits happened in the 70s.
I really don't align myself with anything.
I never wanted to be this week's fashion.
I don't like studio-manicured things.
It was a free-for-all; the BBC wouldn't play anything so we had pirate radio playing the African-American music and the Beatles and greats like Howlin' Wolf and Robert Johnson and Motown's Martha Reeves and the Vandellas and Otis Redding.
Heavy metal these days is what I call wimpy.
After Bad English, I made three albums back-to-back that I still think is my best work, but it wasn't meant to be toured.
Music comes from a whole different place. It tells the story of your life and it's probably the closest thing I have to a religion.
I may not be top of the pops' anymore, but I seem to still be making a big impact.
I've always loved Country, folk, and the acoustic end of music.
Country was always in the background, but now it's the voice of the people. That's what the people want to sing, you know? I'm really thrilled to be a part of it.
The Bad English thing, everybody was playing at once and it was a big wall of sound.
I liked Western country, like cowboy songs, when I was a little kid. Then I developed a taste for Hank Williams and those sort of songs as I got a little bit older.
I realized I didn't want to make another solo record and I would be happier doing something that had more of a gang feel to it, more of a band thing.
To me, The Hard Way' is as raw and vital as anything I was doing when I first started only its way better!
I wanted to write music that would be around for a long time.
I always thought that the Babys were five years ahead of everybody else, I really do.
I like imperfection.
I ran out of steam and patience and so I quit. I really didn't want to make another record. I'd had it with the music business. I went home to England, bought a house and did nothing.
When you play live, everything goes up.
You shouldn't have to follow fashion to make music.
I feel like I've got this great catalogue of songs sink or swim, it doesn't matter. If you've got that, you've got a lot.
The only thing about rock n' roll in my house is a couple of paintings of Jimi Hendrix and Bob Dylan - and they were expensive, too.
I was going to be a painter. I went to art school - but every 16-year-old wants to be a painter.
I love country music, and I did as a kid.
Television really does give you tremendous exposure in America.
I've been away writing songs and recording and doing albums that are much more obscure.
On stage, it's like an argument going on between four people. The argument is the art.
It's amazing what the acoustic guitar can bring to the picture.
The moment you stop becoming an artist, you kind of trade it all in.
In the end, it's always about the three-piece band and the singer.
Oh, man, really, from the moment I could articulate, I was all about music.
In my world, I like everything stripped down, something that's really truthful.
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