I feel the older I get, the more I'm learning to handle life. Being on this quest for a long time, it's all about finding yourself.
Ringo Starr
That's all drugs and alcohol do, they cut off your emotions in the end.
Everything government touches turns to crap.
I like Beethoven, especially the poems.
First and foremost I am a drummer. After that, I'm other things... But I didn't play drums to make money.
Gene Autry was the most. It may sound like a joke - Go and have a look in my bedroom, It's covered with Gene Autry posters. He was my first musical influence.
I never studied anything, really. I didn't study the drums. I joined bands and made all the mistakes onstage.
Drumming is my middle name.
At the end of the day, I can end up just totally wacky, because I've made mountains out of molehills. With meditation, I can keep them as molehills.
America: It's like Britain, only with buttons.
I get by with a little help from my friends.
Being in The Beatles was a short, incredible period of my life. I had 22 years leading up to it, and it was all over eight years later.
I've never been able to sit round on my own and play drums, practice in the back room, never been able to. I've always played with other musicians. It's how I play, there's no joy for me in playing on my own, bashing away. I need a bass, a piano, guitar, whatever, and then I can play.
I am a big Beatles fan. And, you know, unbeknownst to anyone, I used to be one. But I have no problems of putting titles and lines from other songs in my songs, because they're great lines and great titles.
And the White Album is important to me for different reasons. One - I had left the band on the White Album.
I'd like to end up sort of unforgettable.
I mean, women are very important to me. I don't know, they just drive me crazy.
I want to deal with what's in front of me now to the best of my abilities, and sometimes that's not very good. But a lot of the days it is really great.
And I came back and it was great, 'cuz George had set up all these flowers all over the studio saying welcome home. So then we got it together again. I always felt it was better on the White one for me. We were more like a band, you know.
I don't collect any memorabilia. I wish I'd have kept everything I had. But who knew you had to keep it. Just gave it away. And we lost so much and we didn't look after a lot of it.
George was getting alot of independence for himself in those days. He was writing more, and wanted things to go his way - where, when we first started things basically went John and Paul's way. You know, 'cuz they were the writers.
I couldn't put my finger on one reason why we broke up. It was time, and we were spreading out. They were spreading out more than I was. I would've stayed with the band.
The second side of Abbey Road is my favorite.
We will miss George for his sense of love, his sense of music and his sense of laughter.
So this is America. They must be out of their minds.
I'm not sleeping with all the women I appear with.
People only look at me as a Beatle, but my friends look at me as a whole person. That's how life works, but it's not bugging me anymore.
I mean, I was born the day war broke out, but I don't remember all the bombs though they did actually break up Liverpool, you know. I remember when I was a little older, there was big gaps in all the streets where houses used to be. We used to play over them.
People in Liverpool don't move very far, you know.
When they come here, the English make a choice: New York or L.A. L.A. suited me better, I just feel comfortable here.
I don't talk about myself in the third person, and I laugh at people who do.
I love the modern technology now.
That's when we decided to stop in '66. Everyone thought we toured for years, you know, but we didn't. I joined in '62, and we'd finished touring in '66 to go into the studio where we could hear each other... and create any fantasy that came out of anybody's brain.
For me, God is in my life. I don't hide from that... I think the search has been on since the '60s.
And in a marriage you can't TRY and be married. You're married or you're not married... as far as I'm concerned.
Well, I'm getting happier all the time, which is very nice.
I'm on my feet and I'm doing what I love to do, and I'm in a profession, as a musician, where we can go on for as long as we can go on.
If you made a record, I'd probably pick out tracks that I like and download that. That's just how it is.
We've got the children so we have to deal with each other because we have to deal with children's problems, you know, and our own problems. But some days it's fine, and then some days we just are at each other's throat.
I think the most exciting thing is that you expect people our age to know the music, but actually a lot of kids know the music, and if anything is left, we have left really good music, and that's the important part, not the mop-tops or whatever.
And so we went away to play, and we'd come back to Liverpool. And while we were doing this - 'cuz we did it for two years. And then we'd go to Germany, and that's where I met the Beatles.
I've said this over and over again, but I love being in a band.
When I was thirteen I only wanted to be a drummer.
