It Is A Sure Sign

Rock 'n' Roll Is A Combination Of Good Ideas Dried Up By Fads, Terrible Junk, Hideous Failings In Taste And Judgment, Gullibility And Manipulation, Moments Of Unbelievable Clarity And Invention, Pleasure, Fun, Vulgarity, Excess, Novelty And Utter Enervation.

As I Write, Johnny Rotten's First Moments In "anarchy In The U.k." - A Rolling Earthquake Of A Laugh, A Buried Shout, Then Hoary Words Somehow Stripped Of All Claptrap And Set Down In The City Streets - I Am An Antichrist - Remain As Powerful As Anything I Know. Listening To The Record Today - Listening To The Way Johnny Rotten Tears At His Lines, And Then Hurls The Pieces At The World; Recalling The All-consuming Smile He Produced As He Sang - My Back Stiffens; I Pull Away Even As My Scalp Begins To Sweat.

What’s The Impulse Behind Art? It’s Saying In Whatever Language Is The Language Of Your Work, “if I Could Move You As Much As It Moved Me … If I Can Move Anyone A Tenth As Much As That Moved Me, If I Can Spark The Same Sense Of Mystery And Awe And Surprise As That Sparked In Me, Well That’s Why I Do What I Do.”

I Never Could Understand - It Was Impossible For Me To Get My Head Around - What The Furor Was, What The Sense Of Betrayal And Anger And Rage Was About Bob Dylan's Beginning To Perform With A Band, To Play Rock-and-roll, To Get On The Radio.

Along With A Lot Of Other Things, Becoming A Bob Dylan Fan Made Me A Writer. I Was Never Interested In Figuring Out What The Songs Meant. I Was Interested In Figuring Out My Response To Them, And Other People's Responses. I Wanted To Get Closer To The Music Than I Could By Listening To It - I Wanted To Get Inside Of It, Behind It, And Writing About It Through It, Inside Of It, Behind It, Was My Way Of Doing That.