Quote

Straight Edge was a song about my life. There was no structure, no premise as if I was forming a club. There were no tenets. I mean I wrote a song called Straight Edge, I'll take that, but the song was about my life the way I wanted to live it.

Ian MacKaye

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Ian MacKaye
Age: 62
Born: 1962
Born: April 16
Composer
Guitarist
Singer
Washington
District of Columbia
Song
Club
Wanted
Edge
Live
Edges
Clubs
Take
Straight
Tenets
Mean
Wrote
Premise
Way
Structure
Forming
Life
Called
Premises

More quotes by Ian MacKaye

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When you're in a band and write a song on your own, it isn't fully realized until it goes into somebody else's ears.
Ian MacKaye
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I appreciate the past, but I want to make new things. That's the problem with the sack on the back - if you carry it around with you, it's like you get hobbled.
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If people want new music then they are going to have to figure out a way to be patrons of the arts. And they will.
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It makes me sad, the way human beings talk smack. It's why I don't like irony. People are too gleeful to put some teeth into something.
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We were not a band that typically would say, Hello, Whatever Town!
Ian MacKaye
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I have other projects to do. I try not to let that documentation interfere with my present day.
Ian MacKaye
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An unlocked door means that, occasionally, you might get a devil come in, but a locked door means you have thousands of angels just walk by.
Ian MacKaye
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Music is a language and different people who come along are each using that language to do something different, but all coming at it in a similar vein inasmuch as it's always community based and for the most part nonprofit. Most bands don't ever come within a mile of profit - clearly these people are not playing music to make money.
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I'm not a religious person, and I'm not too interested in being a part of a religion, but I do like having some sort of communal gathering, and having some sense of peoples.
Ian MacKaye
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Now anyone can move anywhere. I've made deep connections with people around the world since I tour everywhere that I will simply never see again.
Ian MacKaye
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I think it's my nature to engage in things that are more difficult.
Ian MacKaye
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Every song I ever wrote, I wrote to be heard. So, if I was given a choice that 50 years from now I could either have a dollar or knowing that some kid was listening to my song, I'd go with the kid listening to my song.
Ian MacKaye
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What does bother me is that I have to spend time and energy dealing with the ramifications of what people do think about me.
Ian MacKaye
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In the 90s, there was a yahoo factor where there would be 50 people crowd surfing at one time! It was insane, and it had nothing to do with the music.
Ian MacKaye
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I don't watch TV but occasionally I'll read the Washington Post. I will say that sports are the only real thing on television.
Ian MacKaye
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It doesn't hurt me on a personal level, but it hurts me on a larger level of like, why are people so stupid? Why do we have to go through these unnecessary exercises. Fight crime, don't fight me. If you really want to make a difference don't fight me or Fugazi.
Ian MacKaye
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The amount of money that people spend on saving stuff, they try to feed you this idea that it's more important.
Ian MacKaye
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I obviously use computers. My car is wondrous. My phone is amazing. I've already talked about the music I'm digitizing. Technology is fantastic, of course.
Ian MacKaye
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Archiving is extremely expensive and time consuming. I'm sure an archivist would tell me I'm doing it wrong. It's an industry that's built upon essential ideas, and some of those practices are abusive.
Ian MacKaye
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I have stuff from 1979, 1980 in my collection. But I also have things from 2012. So I don't know if it's memorabilia as much as it is holding on to things that I find relevant that most people might not.
Ian MacKaye