Michael Nesmith quotes

Michael Nesmith was an American musician, songwriter, and producer, best known as a member of the pop-rock band The Monkees. His creative work helped shape the sound and image of the group, and he later became a pioneer in country rock and music video production. He also had a successful solo career and contributed significantly to the music industry. Here are 30 of his quotes:

The only people who steal are thieves, and that's a very small percentage of civilization. Most people want to have some way to make the economic transaction valid. They want to return the favor, if you will... return the benefit and reciprocate. (Michael Nesmith)
It's what the Iraqi people are going through right now. They have encountered a victorious, hostile force-but, you know, there they still are. There their culture is, there their history is, they're not going anywhere. View quote
Michael Nesmith
There are more honest people and more good people than there are thieves and bad people. It's just always been that way. View quote
Michael Nesmith
People recognize intellectual property the same way they recognize real estate. People understand what property is. But it's a new kind of property, and so the understanding uses new control surfaces. It uses a new way of defining the property. View quote
Michael Nesmith
Some ways of using our thinking are really inspiring. There are people who use their thinking to race cars. People use their thinking to build rockets to the moon. It's all just a use of your thinking. View quote
Michael Nesmith
Multimedia scares me off. View quote
Michael Nesmith
The rock sitting on the shelf has potential because it can fall-it's the same way with the Internet. It has this potential. It's not really doing it yet, but it's about to. View quote
Michael Nesmith
I coined a word the other day, but I forgot what it was. It was a good one, it came to me in a dream. View quote
Michael Nesmith
Once the smoke of the market crash clears off, you know, the Internet will pick back up and go. Take a look at what's happening to some of the big companies like eBay and Yahoo, the publicly traded stocks. You know, they're all coming back up off the mat now. View quote
Michael Nesmith
Buzzwords and cliches - those are stock in trade. There's nothing wrong with them. View quote
Michael Nesmith
There's this notion that allows people to create their own collection of songs, so it rewrites what a song is. They may only want 10 seconds of something, or they may only want this particular song, or they want this group of songs. It becomes much more user-controlled. (Michael Nesmith)
I don't quite know what a record is anymore. I don't quite know how to describe it. Don't know how to define it yet, so I'm just letting it gestate, and grow and see if maybe I'll get a better sense of what a record is. View quote
Michael Nesmith
I never feel like I have to hang on to the music. I don't expect that the music will go away. Ideas are the only thing I can point to that are permanent and fixed. View quote
Michael Nesmith
You don't have to fight against being placed in a box any more than the number two has to fight against being the number three. I mean, two is not going to be the number three, ever. View quote
Michael Nesmith
It's important to be precise about words, because of the thought value of them-they frame and shape so much of the way we understand things. View quote
Michael Nesmith
I'm not performing now. What I do now is listen to music all day long. Listening is very nourishing to me. I might go back to perform, I might make another record. I've got a record half finished. View quote
Michael Nesmith
You have to have access to ideas. The Internet is facilitating that access to ideas. In 25 years, the way that data's going to flow back and forth, we don't quite understand yet. View quote
Michael Nesmith
There is a certain logic to events that pushes you along a certain path. You go along the path that feels the most true, and most according to the principles that are guiding you, and that's the way the decisions are made. View quote
Michael Nesmith
As an artist, you don't think about the parabola or the arc you're describing or where you're going to ultimately end up, you're just kind of crawling around, seeing what's out there. View quote
Michael Nesmith
It's clear that people are going to download media files, and they're going to talk to each other, and they're going to exchange information and knowledge and so forth. So this system logic is basically what you bounce off of. View quote
Michael Nesmith
The Internet provides the access to resources, so it's incumbent upon the people who control those resources to make sure that the economic engine stays intact. (Michael Nesmith)
Typically what happens is, somebody drags an idea from the past that worked in an old set of logics that they try to apply to the new one. And it doesn't work. View quote
Michael Nesmith
I haven't been out in the marketplace in a while. I'm thinking about going back into it. I've got some things set up over the next couple of months just to go and see. But I have no idea what the specific way to a solution is anymore. It's mysterious to me. View quote
Michael Nesmith
There's a certain logic to systems, and that logic is fairly self-evident. It's very straightforward, usually. It might take a little research, it might take a little bit of industry to prize it out, but it's there to be seen. View quote
Michael Nesmith
I just finished a novel, and I'm back kind of noodling on the screenplays. Screenplays are tough. I am making music, I'm just not sure what kind of music it is or where it's going. View quote
Michael Nesmith

Michael Nesmith

Michael Nesmith - Image
Photo: Michael Borkson, CC BY 2.0
Occupation: American Musician
Born: December 30, 1942
Died: December 10, 2021
Quotes count: 30