Jonny Greenwood quotes

Jonny Greenwood is an English musician and composer, best known as the lead guitarist of the band Radiohead. Acclaimed for his experimental approach, he has also composed award-winning soundtracks for numerous films. He continues to influence modern music through both his innovative guitar work and his achievements as a composer. Here are 32 of his quotes:

I suppose all of us - we have the old Protestant work ethic of feeling guilty when you're not working, and getting a buzz from feeling like you're really busy. That's the reason to sort of carry on. (Jonny Greenwood)
I fell in love with electronics, which for me was the terra incognita, because I had never heard such sounds. If you'd asked me 50 years ago, I would have said the future of music is only electronic, but I would have been wrong. I learnt how to produce everything I needed with live instrumentalists, so I don't need electronics. View quote
Jonny Greenwood
I sometimes feel a bit embarrassed to play guitar. There's something - I don't want to sound ungrateful - but there's something very old-fashioned and traditional about it. You meet kids today whose grandparents were in punk bands, really. It's very old and traditional, But then, you know, so is an orchestra and so is the string section. View quote
Jonny Greenwood
No, I am not interested in women or sex or anything. View quote
Jonny Greenwood
I think it should be ambitious and good music does deal with life and art and all these wonderful things. View quote
Jonny Greenwood
I think guitarists are really over-admired and over-revered. View quote
Jonny Greenwood
It feels like Radiohead are famous, but that no one knows who we are. Which is brilliant, really. View quote
Jonny Greenwood
I think It's a bit of a disappointment that a lot of people's Golden Age of music is still the '60s. View quote
Jonny Greenwood
I was just very conscious that I could either bore people by having the music be similar for too long, or I could just wear them out and bore them in a different way by having it changing too much every minute or two minutes. So, there was that kind of balance to get right. View quote
Jonny Greenwood
Nothing's more exciting than a day in a studio with a string section - or more ruinously expensive. So it's good to feed that habit away from the band, especially if it means more experience for the next Radiohead string day. View quote
Jonny Greenwood
Jamaican reggae is the style of music I always reach for when ranting to friends about how you could listen to one style of music exclusively for the rest of your life - and it would all be great and varied and worth hearing. (Jonny Greenwood)
If I'm on a train, with headphones, MP3s are great. At home, I prefer CD or vinyl, partly because they sound a little better in a quiet room and partly because they're finite in length and separate things, unlike the endless days and days of music stored on my laptop. View quote
Jonny Greenwood
What I really enjoy about writing for orchestras is realizing that - and it's kind of self-evident - but the fact that they are 48 individuals. It's not, you know, a preset on a keyboard. It's all these people who have opinions and who are making decisions about how to play. View quote
Jonny Greenwood
I'm pampered like you wouldn't believe. View quote
Jonny Greenwood
But I was in the Radiohead studio today and Phil was there drumming and Thom was there playing. We feel like we've only just stopped and already people are wanting us to carry on. View quote
Jonny Greenwood
I remember when I was in my late teens just getting rid of lots of records, realizing I only ever listened to them when I was reading, or watching TV, or doing something else. View quote
Jonny Greenwood
I was happy using cassettes when I was fifteen, but I'm sure they were sneered at in their day by audiophiles. View quote
Jonny Greenwood
It's like that scene from The Player when they talk about merging Star Wars and Kramer vs. Kramer, or whatever. You could do that with music and it would just be awful. View quote
Jonny Greenwood
Obviously there will be a backlash. If you believe the hype you have to believe a backlash too. Any criticism we get, is always stuff we've already criticised ourselves. View quote
Jonny Greenwood
Right now my mind is on the people who stole our instruments, and, specifically, the person with my guitar, which will no doubt end its days having Green Day songs worked out on it. A better fate was deserved - and while the reverence given to guitars annoys me, I shall miss it. View quote
Jonny Greenwood
I'm quite into listening to music and not doing anything else. (Jonny Greenwood)
I suppose subconsciously I was thinking in terms of having the scale of it matching the scale of the images. Hence the sort of string quartet, jazz band and electronic stuff. View quote
Jonny Greenwood
Everything I do feels like It's going to end up being in Radiohead. View quote
Jonny Greenwood
But over a period of time It's the melodic things that are in my head all day. View quote
Jonny Greenwood
I'm happy to write 10 times too much music. View quote
Jonny Greenwood

Jonny Greenwood

Jonny Greenwood - Image
Photo: Zach Klein, CC BY 2.5
Occupation: English Musician
Born: November 5, 1971
Quotes count: 32

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