Debbie Harry Quotations

I get myself a gig somewhere, whether it's in a club, whether it's in a bar, it doesn't matter, and I just work on New Year's Eve because I always feel it's very symbolic for me for the next year, for the new year.

I do know the effect that music still has on me - I'm completely vulnerable to it. I'm seduced by it.

I've had some lovely extraordinary experiences on New Year's Eve.

The only person I really believe in is me.

I'm a culture vulture, and I just want to experience it all.

But, you know, the issues of humanity and what is fair treatment and good treatment of a fellow human being should not really be based on a personal sense of right and wrong or judgment.

I don't mind if my skull ends up on a shelf as long as it's got my name on it.

You always fall for the rascal or the guy who's got a little bit of the devil in him. You can't help it.

I have a lot of regrets, but I'm not going to think of them as regrets.

Lately I've been believing that music predates speech.

I guess people assume I have some sort of totally magical life, but I'm a working musician, fortunately. I've worked on my craft, and I'm very fortunate I've been able to survive in a very competitive industry and enjoy my success. It's not easy.

I could be a housewife… I guess I’ve vacuumed a couple of times.

Music has its own emotional embodiment. It carries an emotion with it. When you associate a lyric with the music, it's much easier; but when you're standing there completely dry in front of the camera with no musical background, just a fine-tuned, get-this-emotional-story across, it's a very, very intense kind of focus.

We probably, as primitive people, made music before we actually had a language, and that's where language comes from.

I think it's a Blondie tradition that all of our albums sort of have a wide spread of styles.

Something's that written out is okay, but it's not always a clear indication of what a person means.

And living in a metropolitan area which is ethnically diverse, our lives are very complicated, so our emotional experiences are going to be varied like that.

I feel like I have to have a voice.

The word 'iconic' is used too frequently - an icon is a statue carved in wood. It was shocking at first, when I got that reference. It was a responsibility, and it's impossible to live up to - you're supposed to be dead, for one thing.

Capote wrote every day. He said that's the only way, you have to sit down every day and do it.

I mean I think that Blondie's influence is a little bit in a way more eclectic than those bands.

Music is wonderful. Especially if there's some kind of content to it.

I thought I'd live to a ripe old age, because I always felt there was a lot to do. I had a driven feeling. I always thought in the present.

If I were to do a foundation, it would be to promote solar energy. And I'm worried about drilling for oil. I think it is harming the earth, 'cos it drains the layer of oil under the surface, and that could be causing earthquakes. It's like we're giving the earth arthritis. I don't know if that sounds crazy.

It's amazing to me to see how bands evolve and how they take all their influences and come up with their own sound.

Music does not carry you along. You have to carry it along strictly by your ability to really just focus on that little small kernel of emotion or story.

New York has always been a city of change and a city about change, and it is a back-leading development. Nobody's going to want to come to New York if it looks like another strip mall.

But computers have changed the world for everyone, so there will be some way of working it out.

That was the impetus for me to do music or art, because I knew if I didn't try when I was young, then I would get to be in my 40's and I'd be really unhappy that I hadn't.

Working as a solo artist has given me a confidence that I didn't have with Blondie.

I always think of a voice as an instrument, whether a voice is a trumpet, or violin, or bass. You know what I mean? A horn or wind instrument versus a string instrument. Horn instruments are definitely more toward jazz.

I really am enjoying writing more than ever. I feel like I'm so much more focused than I was in the early times.

I do have fantasies of buying a helicopter and a lot of machine guns, but I don't know if I can do that. I'd like to have a lot of weapons, grenades and things. And I want to have a solar energy machine. And I want to have a sunken garden with a glass roof. I guess that's about it for now. I have a few other wants but I can't remember them.

To be an artist you have to be as much a businessman to succeed, you have to spend an equal amount of time doing business as you spend doing your craft.

If I had to spend equal time doing paintings, and equal time going to galleries and doing art business, and equal time making music, and equal time going to record companies, or to the publicist or to the lawyer, forget it. It would take four times as long to do all that stuff. Unless I had a patron. That's why Leonardo da Vinci was successful. He had the Medicis, right?

Rock and roll is a misconception. It should no longer be a term for music.

In music the mystical element is definitely there all the time, and one can see it.

I take lots of vitamins, but I don't think that's what keeps us going.

I always work on New Year's Eve, no matter what.

I don't think that the punk sound really became the punk sound until much later. The punk era wasn't really just one musical sound. There are a lot of differences among Television, the Ramones, and the Talking Heads.

That undercurrent of the forbidden was always a part of rock.

For me, performance is about forgetting what I'm wearing. Just putting it on and knowing it's right.

And I wasn't convinced that I was the most talented person in the world.

I think that people in general, whether they are male or female, who are inhibited by the clichés of what women are or what men are, really don't like themselves. Because personality traits are not necessarily sexual.

But as a writer and performer, I want to get paid for what I do.

And New Year's Eve is very, very important to me.

We wanted to enjoy what we were doing and we had business things we had to straighten out and personnel problems and it sort of took a little time to do it.

The counselor at our clinic would cry with the girls at the drop of a hat. She would find their weakness and work on it. The women were never given any alternatives. They were told how much trouble it is to have a baby.

I love the ACLU and I'm concerned now, especially when it comes to our rights, with current politics and the religious community and the Conservative majority or minority - I don't know who they are.

I'm against the idea that rock stars have to live a life that's completely understandable or predictable to their audience....Maybe I'll just be the mysterious figure that'll never be able to truly be defined. Maybe that's what my thing is.

I really, really like writing songs. Capote wrote every day. He said that's the only way, you have to sit down every day and do it...Something that's written out is okay, but it's not always a clear indication of what a person means.

Christina Aguilera is an incredible musician and singer.

The only thing I really wanted to be was a beatnik, and look what happened: I ended up being in a band.

I think that G-O-D is like the answer to a formula for creating life.

Morality should have to do with killing people or hurting them or stealing from them, but when it comes to adult choices, I don't see it.

That was always what I felt was the beauty of Rock 'n' Roll, it was entertainment and showbiz yet it had the idea of the voice of the people, it had an essence to it which was socially motivated. Not that I want to change to world, you know? But it was sort of relevant to real life, it involved the real essence of poetry or the real essence of fine art. But it was also entertainment. That was the real vitality.

You have to leave room for the other person's ego.

I really am a mystic. I don't know where I got it from.

How can one be a woman and not be a feminist? That's my question.

I always say the new album is the best one yet. I always feel that - I really do, because it's the latest and it's the newest and it's a little bit better.

A lot of the bands were really, really different and a lot of them actually didn't become huge but I think were hugely influential.

I turned on VH1 this morning just to get a little warm-up before I came over here, and I think it's just terrific. There's so much great stuff: diverse and wonderful music, good performances, great looking girls, great videos, the whole thing.

I'm very proud of the fact that I was in two really interesting movies in the last year: one was Spun and the other was My Life Without Me.