Born March 1, 1944, Roger Daltrey rose to fame and fortune thanks to the British-born band The Who, which Daltrey fronted and sang for, performing acclaimed songs like “My Generation,” “Pinball Wizard” and “Won’t Get Fooled Again.”
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Today, The Who is considered one of the most important bands in rock music, one of the principal groups to come over to the United States as part of the 1960s British Invasion. Indeed, Daltrey is a rock icon thanks to his hard-hitting tunes.
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One might wonder what Daltrey has to say about life and love, his group, his craft, and the world around given his experience and fame. Below are the 20 best Roger Daltrey quotes.
1. “We weren’t wealthy but we definitely weren’t poor. We were incredibly rich because there was a wonderful community in Shepherd’s Bush, where I grew up. All my friends were into villainy and crime.”
2. “I had my jaw broken, and so my chin stuck way out. That’s how I became tough—I learned to pick up anything and fight back.”
3. “Well, for the My Generation album, there was nothing to be nervous about in them days. We used to take every day as it came. Every day was just a gig and I think we did the recording between gigs literally.”
4. “I don’t think there’s any way it could have failed. We don’t know failure in this band. We didn’t know failure. We got to know it a little after a while but at that time there was no such word.”
5. “Part of the early Who career was all about knocking people’s confidences out.”
6. “We were too rough at the edges to be a pop group.”
7. “I think Pete did have a hard time as a kid with his appearance. But don’t all kids have a hard time? God, I had a hard time, too. I was little with bow legs and rickets. I used to get picked on like everybody used to get picked on.”
8. “We tend to think of age only in time, but I don’t think it has much to do with time at all; there’s a whole load of other things. I’ve met 16-year-olds who are old and 90-year-olds who are young.”
9. “I know without our fans and the devotion of our fans we wouldn’t be here. I don’t mean to put them down, but I’m just stating a fact that it is hard to play to people that see you all the time and it takes a lot of fun out of it in some ways.”
10. “You have to keep fit being a singer—that’s part of the job. You can’t do it unless you have incredible stamina.”
11. “I don’t know many singers who actually do like the sound of their own voice.”
12. “But contrary to what some people seem to think, I was never a bully. I was just a hard man.”
13. “I’ve always felt that music is an art form that deserves to live the life of the artist.”
14. “You can do too much and oversell your market.”
15. “I have deliberately kept singing because I have to at my age. If I stopped for even a year my voice would slowly deteriorate until it’s not there at all. That’s a fact about getting to my age.”
16. “We lived the life with Keith Moon. It was all Spinal Tap magnified a thousand times.”
17. “I never understood that if you sweat as much as I used to every night, you drain your body of salts. So I got very, very, seriously ill. I got to the stage where I was almost hospitalized with serious problems.”
18. “I call it fan fatigue. I went to see Bob Dylan last year, who I think is absolutely incredible, but he suffers from his audience.”
19. “My love for the band is still there. It hasn’t changed, maybe that’s why it’s so painful these days.”
20. “I don’t have any illusions anymore. The illusion that rock ‘n’ roll could change anything—I don’t believe that. I’ve changed.”
Photo by Samir Hussein/WireImage
