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" I don't have a long history of hit singles of my own. I had a few, and I had a little hot streak in the '70s, but I've had a lot of success producing other people. "
Todd Rundgren
Own
History
Success
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" The Nazz survived for 18 months - that was my first taste of fame on some level and of the overall experience of being in a band. There are good and bad aspects, and I got to taste some of both, and, well, it's not as much fun as what you see in 'A Hard Day's Night,' let me just say that. "
Todd Rundgren
Experience
Good
Fun
" Music is the way I understand how to communicate now, the way that I've learned how to communicate... but it will eventually have to go beyond that. You see, I've realised that music is not what keeps people involved - it's the attitude behind the music. "
Todd Rundgren
Understand
Attitude
Music
" All it takes to become president is money and a certain kind of power. Being president is the first thing I can shoot for, not the highest. It may come to a point where people take rock and roll musicians more seriously than they take politicians. It may eventually turn out that musicians have more credibility. "
Todd Rundgren
Power
People
Money
" Once I go on stage, the atmosphere is totally theatrical. The greater the illusion, the greater the intensity of the excitement it creates. "
Todd Rundgren
Excitement
Once
Illusion
" And so it's inescapable and people who proclaim scrupulous honesty can only proclaim that if they don't examine closely the things they believe. "
Todd Rundgren
Believe
Honesty
People
" There's only one band that could ever even pretend to assume the mantle of what the Beatles did, who have been so pre-eminent and world-dominating that they could effect a paradigm shift in the culture, who have been willing to leverage their success into musical change, and that is U2 - regardless of what the result of that is. "
Todd Rundgren
Culture
Success
Band
" When I got out of the Nazz, I had it in my mind that simply to be eclectic was an important aspect of making music. It was something that I derived from The Beatles. "
Todd Rundgren
Out
Got
Important
" I decided early on that I wanted to be Michael Bloomfield, Jeff Beck and Eric Clapton - not George Harrison. "
Todd Rundgren
Eric
Early
Decided
" I'm a guitar player, really - I mean, first and foremost - I grew up with all that great 1960s music, in terms of growing up, becoming a musician, so it's like first-love stuff; I'm always going to go back to it. "
Todd Rundgren
Great
Music
Guitar
" So I don't think I'm gonna pull my head into my shell just because a bunch of people start acting like idiots. "
Todd Rundgren
Like
Start
Acting
" The New York Dolls did not think of themselves as punk rock. There was no such term at the time. They were just another band in what was called the New York scene. "
Todd Rundgren
Time
Band
New
" I was lucky enough to grow up in an era when radio was less formatted. It was really special. You could hear a jazz song then a pop song then a show tune then some jazz. Basically, whatever the DJ felt like playing, he would play. He was educating you and exposing you to things you would never hear otherwise. "
Todd Rundgren
Grow
Song
You
" It seems like there are two worlds out there - one that has revolved around 'Breaking Bad,' and then the one that I've been in, which just kind of observes it from afar. "
Todd Rundgren
Two
Kind
Breaking
" I've got billions of sparrows to worry about as well as everything else'. So there's the whole idea that whatever it is that you believe, it can never be valid unless you have some consensus reality demonstration. "
Todd Rundgren
Reality
Believe
Got
" Kids don't want to dye their whole head another color; that's what their mothers do. "
Todd Rundgren
Head
Want
Color
" When the Beatles first came out, you had to go to a certain amount of trouble to have long hair. You just couldn't have it immediately. Anything you can just go out and get - like platform shoes - is not going to inspire people as much as something they have to go through a little bit of hell to have. "
Todd Rundgren
Hair
People
Long
" It's great if you can afford to carry a string section on the road with you, but most people are used to the idea of just a keyboard player creating those string sounds. "
Todd Rundgren
Road
Used
People
" By the time my first solo record came out, I was making a handsome living as a record producer. I had worked with the Band, Janis Joplin and all of these other artists in the Albert Grossman organization. So as my so-called solo career evolved, I never felt pressure that I had to come back and top when I might've done before. "
Todd Rundgren
Organization
Time
Pressure
" There are some things that we know are just not as pleasant as the lies that we tell ourselves, and in that sense in order to endure existence everyone endures a certain amount of dishonesty in their everyday lives. "
Todd Rundgren
Everyday
Existence
Know
" So there was a way for you to get promoted and survive as an artist without worrying about AM radio hits. "
Todd Rundgren
Radio
You
Way
" On occasion, I hear a rearrangement of a song that really makes me reevaluate it in a way. "
Todd Rundgren
Me
Hear
Really
" There are still people who believe in that and wake up every day believing it's possible, and invest their whole selves in that. "
Todd Rundgren
Day
Wake Up
People
" In a way, I created Utopia as a platform for me to become more of a guitar player and less of the kind of balladeer that people were taking me for. "
Todd Rundgren
Way
Guitar
Kind
" When I got out of high school, I was in a blues band. It was the kind of music I was interested in, and listening to, mostly because it was becoming a vehicle for a generation of guitarists - like Jeff Beck and Eric Clapton. Mike Bloomfield. And that's what I wanted to be, principally: a guitar player. "
Todd Rundgren
Music
School
Listening
" I want to be known as a professional weirdo. There aren't many Salvador Dalis or Buckminster Fullers left. If I become popular enough, I can establish the next step for records. "
Todd Rundgren
Professional
I Can
Enough
" The Toddstock thing is the closest thing, I have to say, a Grateful Dead sort of thing where it all lapses over from the formality of a concert into more of a lifestyle thing. "
Todd Rundgren
Grateful
Dead
Lifestyle
" I figure it could become a self-fulfilling prophecy; if I make a successful arena rock record, I'll wind up playing arenas! I wouldn't mind being back in that kind of venue because of the kinds of things you can do with production. You can make your shows more interesting, which would be fun to do. "
Todd Rundgren
Fun
Wind
Rock
" I used to have sort of mixed feelings about a producer whose only skills seemed to be going into the studio, schmoozing the artists and making them feel good. I can see now that in some cases, that's what you have to do because that's the only way you're going to get them to produce. "
Todd Rundgren
You
Good
Feel
" People write me letters and say I should answer them. But I don't like to answer letters. I don't write letters. I've never written my mother one. "
Todd Rundgren
Say
People
Never
" I'm not a one-hit wonder as some suggest. I've had a couple of hits, but still, all of my hits were in the '70s. There was pretty much nothing in the '80s, '90s, or in the first full decade into the next millennium. "
Todd Rundgren
Decade
First
Pretty