Joe Elliott

“The Vatican takes your breath away.”

“Any idiot who knows five chords can bang a song together. But it's probably going to be rubbish.”

“When we try to write a pop song, we go for standard pop arrangements, even to the point where we will go to the key change at the end, which is really cheesy.”

“I saw the Stones three years ago at the Wiltern Theater in L.A. and that was mind blowing.”

“If you can't handle the responsibility of a hit single, don't write one.”

“The most frustrating thing for musicians who want to play stuff from the new album is when everyone goes out to buy a beer.”

“I wanted to write a song that's known to the world as a classic, stadium-rock anthem.”

“The best holiday I ever had was the first one I went on without my parents, when I was 17.”

“I don't really feel any different when I get up on stage.”

“It's big production. It's huge. It's using studio technology to your benefit. You don't go in and play live and then just take the tapes and get them mastered. You have to create.”

“Even Crazy Horses is a good song, by the Osmonds. I've known many bands who have covered that. It's just a great song. I bought it in a brown, paper bag because I didn't want anyone to know I had it.”

“A fan would get an autograph and that was that. If we didn't tour again for five years, we wouldn't remember them.”

“That's why 60,000 people go ape when the Stones play 'Satisfaction.' The songs are part of their legacy, and you fall back in love with them over the years.”

“Every town in America had at least one, two, or maybe three radio stations that played rock 24 hours a day. In England, we had a rock specialist on for two hours a week.”

“In England, rock music very rarely infiltrates the charts, but country music even less so.”

“We used to have our own plane with the band's name on the side. It was a dream come true. You drive to a local airport. There's none of this checking in stuff; you just get on the plane.”

“If you don't physically age gracefully, it's a bit sad. I think Steven Tyler can get away anything, because he still looks like he did in '73. Especially from row Z backwards in an arena. As long as the Stones keep their hair and don't get fat they'll get away with the wrinkles.”

“There were incredibly few rock songs making it out to the airwaves until the '80s came along.”

“Manhattan's always fascinating, too, just a big, stinky, smelly conglomeration of numbered avenues and streets, but it's just got a vibe that's hard to beat. I shouldn't like it, but I do. I can't put my finger on it.”

“Writing a song is actually quite easy. Writing a good one is very, very difficult.”