Gord Downie

“The Bruins have become so much more to me than some boyhood fascination.”

“You sort of get so lulled into thinking of yourself as this five-headed thing, the group, the band, The Hip. I guess you just forget it's a family, and like every good family, you can forget. But you're also committed to each other, so there's always room to grow, to learn and relearn.”

“What would be great is if everyone who bought a record got a comp ticket to a show.”

“I'm grateful for the friendships and being able to show it, for people's dancing pleasure.”

“We were interested in making a long career out of this, rather than being 'Canada's Newest Hitmakers.' It seems to work, and it trickles down to every aspect of the band.”

“When someone gives you a piece of music, they are really giving you a piece of themselves.”

“If we weren't in this band, some of us wouldn't be playing at all. You have tiffs with someone when he has smelly feet in the touring van, but we all respect each other as friends first.”

“I think the recording industry is founded on that principle: to approximate the live experience, to approximate that thing that evaporates as it's happening, disappears as it's happening.”

“I like Al Purdy.”

“Even 'The Inevitability of Death' is kind of a funny song more than anything. I mean, I thought it would be funny imagining radio deejays cueing it up and announcing it as people are driving off to work.”