A Quote by Rick Nielsen

If we waited for a hit record to tour, we would never have toured. — © Rick Nielsen
If we waited for a hit record to tour, we would never have toured.
As musicians, we are quite literally singing for our supper. Don't get me wrong, I love touring, but the reality is that our idols from the '70s and '80s never toured this hard. They'd do a record, have one big world tour, maybe two, then break to do another record.
In the year after we signed with I.R.S. we made a record, started our own tour, toured with the Police, and our record went to No. 1. It was insane.
My life used to be record, tour, record, tour. You can never say no as a freelance musician. I was on the road 200 days a year.
Are people crazy? People waited all their lives. They waited to live, they waited to die. They waited in line to buy toilet paper. They waited in line for money. And if they didn't have any money they waited in longer lines. You waited to go to sleep and then you waited to awaken. You waited to get married and you waited to get divorced. You waited for it to rain, you waited for it to stop. You waited to eat and then you waited to eat again. You waited in a shrink's office with a bunch of psychos and you wondered if you were one.
Back before Napster and Spotify, we toured to promote record sales. Now we make records to promote tour dates.
I only toured for three months. As soon as I got off [tour], I was just dying to start recording, because it was on my mind: 'I've got to make another record now.' And I was totally excited.
Over all these years, I have never had a hit movie, never had a hit television programme and never had a hit record. To my way of thinking, that means success has not been achieved. I have made no mark of my own creation. This is something to be considered.
I never want to record something that I'm not proud of just because I think it might be a big hit. There's no positive about that because if you record a song you hate and it's a big hit, then you're singing a song every night that you hate. And if you record a song that you hate and it isn't a hit, then you sold out for no reason.
I waited, and I’m sure Elvis did too, for each Ricky Nelson record like we would a Chuck Berry record or a Fats Domino record, to see what was going on. I used to say to some of the guys that Ricky Nelson learned to sing on million selling records.
So we are not doing the traditional album, tour, album, tour, album, tour anymore. We're going to tour when we want to, regardless of whether we've got a record out.
Whenever I approach a record, I don't really have a science to it. I approach every record differently. First record was in a home studio. Second record was a live record. Third record was made while I was on tour. Fourth record was made over the course of, like, two years in David Kahn's basement.
I am living my real life, this is it. Now is now, and if I waited to be happier, waited to have fun, waited to do the things that I know I ought to do, I might never get the chance.
Traditionally the show must go on which is a stupid thing to say, but that in a nutshell is what's going on. We have a new record out; if we won't tour, the new record dies. It's reality - it's what business is nowadays. You just need to tour to sell your albums.
If I had had a chance to tour with Van Halen before the record, I think it would have been a different record.
Things like 'Lucky Man' were never written to even be a record, let alone a hit record.
The book tour has been really interesting and very gratifying. I have not book toured before. I've never had quite as much pleasure, as much satisfaction.
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