If you’ve ever had Saturday Night Fever, you have Barry Gibb and the Bee Gees to thank.
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The 76-year-old, Isle of Man-born Gibb was, of course, a founding member of the Bee Gees, along with his brothers Robin and Maurice.
Together, the three brought disco to the masses with their falsetto harmonies and gold chain-inspired songs like “Stayin’ Alive.” (For more, check out the HBO documentary, How Can You Mend A Broken Heart.)
Here, we wanted to dive deeper into the mind of Barry, in particular. To see what the last remaining Gibb brother has to say about the world around him, about life and love, his craft, and more. Here are the 20 best Barry Gibb quotes.
1. “As long as you’re having fun, that’s the key. The moment it becomes a grind, it’s over.”
2. “It is not the money but the self-respect and wanting to create good music.”
3. “I have a huge ego and a huge inferiority complex at the same time.”
4. “I’m very much a family person.”
5. “I’ve worked with a lot of people who are more famous than myself who are terribly insecure.”
6. “When you are in your 20’s and 30’s, you just want a hit record and you don’t really care how it happens.”
7. “But all bubbles have a way of bursting or being deflated in the end.”
8. “I would be content if I had nothing but a tape recorder. I could still write songs and record them.”
9. “The secret is to make sure your family comes before anything else, because no matter what you do you’ve got to come home.”
10. “I have a little dictaphone and if a sound takes my fancy or if a lyric comes to me in the middle of the night I’ll just record it there and then.”
11. “I don’t ever wish I was somebody else.”
12. “I’m Mr. Boring, not a party-goer at all.”
13. “Our parents came home one day and heard us, and they thought it was the radio, but our grandfather told them it was us.”
14. “The only thing that exists to me is commercial pop music.”
15. “When you write a song you have an idea of how it should be sung but it doesn’t work out that way if someone else records it.”
16. “Maurice would prance into a room, you know, and his presence was immediate.”
17. “We had to leave Australia to become international stars.”
18. “We were very influenced by The Beatles, no question.”
19. “It was great being together as a band, but much more difficult being brothers than it was being in a band.”
20. “You are never really prepared for criticism.”
Photo: Desiree Prieto / Sacks & Co.
