Viv Albertine Quotes

Viv Albertine

Profession : Musician

Birth : December 1, 1954

I'm very true to the old punk ethics of honesty and truthfulness and integrity... and still be authentic.

Viv Albertine

I copied John Lennon; I copied a bit of David Bowie. It's such a shame, and I'm so glad that now young girls have so many different role models in all different walks of life.

Viv Albertine

We grew up during the 'peace and love' of the 1960s, only to discover that there are wars everywhere, and love and romance is a con.

Viv Albertine

There's a fine line between brave and mad. But whatever I do, I go for it.

Viv Albertine

Female rage is not often acknowledged - never mind written about - so one of the questions I'm asking is, 'Are you allowed to be this angry as you grow older as a woman?' But I'm also trying to trace where my anger came from. Who made me the person that is still so raw and angry? I think that it's empowering to ask that question.

Viv Albertine

I still live very much by punk ethics, but in a more grown up way.

Viv Albertine

I like to rattle cages.

Viv Albertine

People say you mellow as you get older, and I really haven't.

Viv Albertine

There was an angry wave in the '70s, a strong feminist angry wave. I remember thinking - oh my God - I thought it was the beginning of something, and it all went quiet.

Viv Albertine

I hate to say it, but one of the worst things you could be called when I was younger was unfeminine.

Viv Albertine

We used to have massively long discussions about how we should stand on stage. Should we stand with our legs apart? No, all the guys with guitars in skinny jeans stand with their legs apart, and you'd think, 'We can't stand like that.' We'd spend hours and hours, days and days, discussing how to stand.

Viv Albertine

Look at Kate Bush, Patti Smith, Yoko Ono - three really private people, but when they're on stage or when they're singing, they let go like no one else.

Viv Albertine

I think sometimes men find it easier to be a carer than an accessory. I mean, most women I know in bands are pretty lonely. Guys don't want to travel around with you. I know loads of women who do it, but guys don't do it. They're not brought up for it.

Viv Albertine

The more blows you have in life, the better, because it means you're challenging yourself.

Viv Albertine

Doctors didn't know if I would survive. The cancer was too big to operate on, so they blitzed it with chemotherapy and radiotherapy.

Viv Albertine

I've had to fight for everything.

Viv Albertine

I'm still angry at so much - class, gender, society, the way we are constantly mentally coerced into behaving a certain way without us even knowing it. I feel so oppressed by the weight of it all that I just want to blow a hole in it all.

Viv Albertine

When you've fought and fought to keep positive and to keep creative even though there was not a space to be creative, well, you show me any human who is not angry after 60 years of that.

Viv Albertine

I want to say to younger women especially that it's OK to be an outsider. It's OK to admit to your rage. You're not the only person walking down the street feeling angry inside.

Viv Albertine

We were very deliberately not playing 12-bar structures, blues structures, which rock musicians turned into such a cliche. We tried to... listen to the rhythms within ourselves and take the normal words we used every day in our normal thoughts, which girls hadn't written about before.

Viv Albertine