Song Quotes by Lee Ranaldo

Songs seem to always spring from improvisation.

— Lee Ranaldo

Every band runs its course.

— Lee Ranaldo

When Sonic Youth wrote music, we would rehearse for months before anybody heard anything.

— Lee Ranaldo

We're not really an underground band anymore, and we're not a mainstream band, either.

— Lee Ranaldo

The Strokes will never get anywhere after that first record.

— Lee Ranaldo

I didn't intend to make one solo record, much less two. It's really a matter of seeing how it goes.

— Lee Ranaldo

It's easier to write about a celebrity, a personality, than it is to dig in and write about the music.

— Lee Ranaldo

I'd rather have vinyl and a download code than a CD any day.

— Lee Ranaldo

Obviously, for Geffen, if it wasn't for us, it's quite possible that bands like Nirvana or Beck would not be on the…

— Lee Ranaldo

When you listen to early Leonard Cohen records or Joni Mitchell records, you feel like a window is being opened into someone's…

— Lee Ranaldo

Sometimes it takes us a long time to build up songs, and we really work the structures over and over and build…

— Lee Ranaldo

Sometimes, for me, lyrics are derived from poems that I'm working on, and they kind of cross back and forth between the…

— Lee Ranaldo

I'm so used to knowing what to do with an electric guitar and amplifier, but with an acoustic guitar, it's different, but…

— Lee Ranaldo

I've never been a huge Zeppelin fan, much to the chagrin of everybody else in my former band. But certainly those Pink…

— Lee Ranaldo

What Nirvana's success means is that certain radio stations now have their ear more cocked to bands like us; they're more open…

— Lee Ranaldo

When I was in grade school and high school, I did a lot of chorale singing. And the chorus would be tenor,…

— Lee Ranaldo

Certainly our records could be found in most of the mom and pop indie stores, but we still found there were a…

— Lee Ranaldo

Like everybody else, I love a good pop song. You know, there's nothing like it. I also just really like music that…

— Lee Ranaldo

Signing to a major, there weren't many bands from our sphere that were doing it. I mean, obviously R.E.M. had done it,…

— Lee Ranaldo

When we first started, in the early Eighties, we had some crappy guitars - Japanese knockoffs that wouldn't hold standard tuning. Later,…

— Lee Ranaldo

'Europe '72' was a super influential record full of fantastic songs and amazing experimental musicianship. I always valued both of those aspects…

— Lee Ranaldo

I'm just old enough to be able to say I got those very first Beatles records right as they were hitting America.…

— Lee Ranaldo

We're obviously not a platinum-selling band, and yet we've managed to maintain a career on a major label through all this time,…

— Lee Ranaldo

Signing to a major label was an experiment for us. It was a challenge: working in a big studio with a producer…

— Lee Ranaldo

Of course you want to keep making good records, but I think there were certain aspects to the indie rock situation at…

— Lee Ranaldo

My main pedal is the Ibanez Analog Delay, the AD9 or the AD80, whichever one it is. That's my go-to pedal for…

— Lee Ranaldo

One of the key guitars in my career has been an early-Seventies Fender Telecaster Deluxe that I had before Sonic Youth started…

— Lee Ranaldo

We always operated within a sense of community not just about the band. It's important to the way we define ourselves. It's…

— Lee Ranaldo

I always think that, for me, being someone who comes out of electric guitar experimentation, the idea of playing acoustic guitar is,…

— Lee Ranaldo

I've always been an acoustic guitar player, and I've pretty much continued to play acoustic guitar throughout all of the Sonic Youth…

— Lee Ranaldo

When I first learned guitar - when I was 14 or 15 - I had an older cousin who showed me some…

— Lee Ranaldo

We'd been on Geffen for a long time, and I think we felt that we needed a change. I just don't think…

— Lee Ranaldo

'Daydream' brought us to the top of the heap of the indie-college market and recognition by all of our peers; 'Daydream' kind…

— Lee Ranaldo