Steve Winwood Quotations

The percentage you're paying is too high priced While you're living beyond all your means And the man in the suit has just bought a new car From the profit he's made on your dreams.

I got thrown out of music school for even listening to Fats Domino and Ray Charles. I was asked, 'What kind of music do you like to listen to?' and I said, 'Well, I do like Paul Hindemith and Igor Stravinsky but I also like Fats Domino and Ray Charles,' and they literally said, 'Either forget about that or leave.'

It could be my British need for discipline that makes me admire the American appetite for freedom & passion.

Don't buy this 'believe in yourself' rubbish. Why do they keep telling youngsters that? There's no point believing in yourself if you don't know what you're doing. Once you've got a vision of what you want to do, by all means stick to that passionately and doggedly. Believe in your ideas. It's not quite the same thing.

I think a lot of people came into rock n' roll to try to change the world. I came into rock n' roll to make music.

You would probably think that rock music is an urban phenomena, but the main reason for doing it in '68 was so that we could play music very loud any time of the day or night without getting complaints from the neighbours.

A band is not a marriage. There are no oaths of allegiance. If you feel your life will be better served by splitting up the group, you've got to do it - but of course it does cause problems.

Don't you know by now, luck don't lead to anything or why you keep on moving

If you call someone up on a mistake - if the drummers put an extra beat in a bar or something - you have a lot more authority if you can show them how to do it right.

Listening to music for me is like homework. Music will give me enjoyment, but as soon as it's giving me that enjoyment, I want to analyse it, and then it becomes work. Why does it sound like that? How?... then I dissect it.

A lot of people think that the music was responsible for a lot of changes in the Sixties, but I think the music came out of it. The music wouldnt have happened without the social changes.

The music I write, I feel, is not the kind of music for a 25-year-old.

Here we were supposedly changing the world for the better in the Sixties, but as we get 40 years further down the line, we realise that some of those changes such as the drugs probably weren't all that great or sensible. It was all about social experiments.

It's an often-asked question, 'Why did all these spotty white English boys suddenly start playing blues in the '60s?' It was recognized as this kind of vibrant music and when I first started playing in a blues band I just wanted to bring it to a wider public who hadn't really heard it.

To make a living from doing something I love is fantastic. As long as people want to listen to me, I'll keep doing it. In fact, to tell you the truth, even if no one did want to listen to me, I'd still be doing it!

Obviously, the Sixties was a time when everyone wanted to experiment, and then everything became very formulated and corporate, so artists tended to get pushed into a kind of pattern. Now, I think that has continued with the emergence of televised talent shows like 'X Factor.'

One of my problems is I'm not really sure if I slot into rock or not. I've always tried to combine world music, folk, jazz, blues and rock, and have done since Traffic.

Punk was more based on social change than on music, so it didn't bother me too much. It wasn't really a musical threat.

In some respects I'm quite easily led, so I have to make sure I've got my own space, and that I feel comfortable in my working environment. It's very important for me to work with the right collaborators, as I can easily get led into a corner where I'm not comfortable.

My goal has always been to make classic records, classic albums. Sometimes the recording process and the era it was recorded in means the production leans in a particular way, but to me they are all part of the same process.

We released it on our own label, so it wasn't really a wide distribution but for our own little humble operation, we were very happy with the results, ... But a lot of people have asked me what I've done lately. And when I say I had an album out the last couple of years, they actually didn't know that.

I've now been adding some of the songs from 'The Last Great Traffic Jam, ... So I cannot possibly play (all) these songs in three hours but I do change the set up every night. We always enjoy playing.

All through the kind of late '80s and '90s, every A&R record company man was saying, 'Now what we want is another record like 'Back in the High Life.' And, of course, that's not the way to make music at all. That's the tail wagging the dog.

And also there hasn't been much footage of Traffic either. There is very little in existence and since Traffic is a very enigmatic and unusual band, we thought that now was the time to put this out and give people a taste of what Traffic was really about.

In life you can get a feeling which is part of a person, the same as in the songs. Music is almost our representation of our fantasies and so our songs are representations of our fantasies.

The living together is very important in a way. It's important for writing. It wouldn't be important if we were like just getting other people's numbers together, we'd just have to meet at rehearsals, but writing is something almost completely different.

While you see a chance take it, find romance, fake it, because it's all on you.

One man puts the fire out, the other lights the fuse.

When the rhythm and night ride, no heart can hide.

I'm the same boy I used to be.

Networking is rubbish; have friends instead.

Think about it, there must be higher love Down in the heart or hidden in the stars above Without it, life is a wasted time Look inside your heart, I'll look inside mine.

The music industry went through such a strange stretch in 1977, especially in this country, with the whole punk rock thing coming about. Punk was rebellious-and justified in that response-but it had very little to do with music, and so it created a highly-charged but frighteningly floundering atmosphere that I found very, very disheartening. Musical quality for me has always been an important part of rock'n'roll-and winning recognition for that has long been an uphill battle all the way. Punk seemed like rock'n'roll utterly without the music.

Punk [rock] seemed like rock 'n' roll music utterly without the music.

Look inside your heart, I'll look inside mine.

If you hold me, I will let you into my dreams.

What selfish seeds I plant along the way, black harvest today.

Where's that higher love I keep thinking of?

I was in college, but I got kicked out. It was a very free school, but I created a "bad impression." Like I was a bit more fiery in those days. At the time I got kicked out, I knew exactly what I was going to do and didn't even bother to go back for a leaving certificate. Then I was singing in folk clubs around Birmingham and playing jazz in clubs on Sundays.

While there is time, let's go out and do everything.

Savor the throne, but don't mind the stool.

The voices inside you can lead your soul astray Believe in what you dream Don't turn away don't you turn away. Reach for the light You might touch the sky Stand on the mountaintop and see yourself flying Reach for the light to capture a star Come out of the darkness and find out who you are.

When life is too much, roll with it, baby.

Half of us is easy, the other half is hard. Even though we do our best, we end up being scarred.

If nothing is the way it seems, then this life is just a haunted dream.

Time is a river rolling into nowhere. We must live while we can, and we'll drink our cup of laughter.

Music is a science, in many ways it's mathematical.

The finer things I feel in me, the golden dance life could be.