[The Soup Nazi]

Several years ago, somebody compiled an anthology of Bob Pollard's stage banter. Seems like a good time to revisit it!

"If the guy next to you ever bought a Counting Crows album, punch him in the face!"

"Don't you guys think Led Zeppelin would have been better if I had been their singer? Robert Plant SUCKS."

"I think Bob Dylan sucks. Bob Dylan never wrote a good song."

"Devo is better than the Beatles."

"Mickey Dolenz is the best American rock singer ever."

"You can't say anything bad about Willie Nelson. Willie Nelson is a legend. But you know what? Willie Nelson sucks. You know what he said? He said when he heard the music of Matchbox 20 it renewed his faith in songwriting. Fuck that guy!"

[After pondering how his lyric "We'll even the score in World War Four" doesn't really make any sense, he went on to say:]
"Just shows how you shouldn't think too hard about your lyrics. Somebody should tell that to Michael Stipe. Have you had enough of that guy? That dude's a weirdo! His problem is he thinks he's smart."

"The difference between us and Sonic Youth is that Sonic Youth will play 2½ hours. They will do that. We will play 2½ and maybe three hours. But in that 2½ hours, we will play 55 or maybe 60 songs. Sonic Youth will play 12."

"Yoshimi Versus The Pink Robots? My fourth graders could have come up with a better album title."

"We're playing more hits than Tommy James and the Shondells."

"Radiohead? Those motherfuckers never played a good riff in their lives!"

"Then in the early 90s we became the kings of the lo-fi genre... and Pavement was pissed! Pavement was pissed!"

"What we taught the world is that you can suck and still rule."

"So who do you think is paying the bills at Matador? Cat Power? She sucks. Yo La Tango? [sic] Interpol? Uh, wait, I guess Interpol is paying the bills..."

"The worst band from 1966 is better than any band on MTV right now."

[At a show in Seattle:]
"Hello, we're Guided by Voices. We're not big Hendrix fans, but boy we sure do love that Mudhoney."

"We like to keep a cooler of beer on stage... because we're hopeless, pathetic alcoholics... and we say fuck you, that's what we say to it. Everyone that says we have a drinking problem, we say fuck you. I said it to my mom."

"I'm pretty fucked up, so if I fuck it up, fuck it."

"Now I'm so fucked up already I can't even talk. Hey HEY! — You're out there, and you think you're watching us disintegrate in front of your eyes. No. No — we are watching YOU disintegrate in front of OUR eyes. That's right! We are doing a three hour show and by the end we'll still be standing and you will all be a fuckin' mess!"

"You know, you think we're up here talking a lot and you're like — how come they're doing so much talking? Why don't you play some music? You know why? Because this is HALF TIME. Most bands, they'd be done right now. Uh uh. Not us! This is HALF TIME kids. Other bands would be done right now. We are only half way through!"

"Guided By Voices is the best band name. It's symmetrical. Guided — seven letters. By — two letters. Voices — seven letters."

"Here's a song off Bee Thousand. D'you know if you hold your tongue and say 'Pete Townshend' it sounds like Bee Thousand? Here try it..."

"Hey, who's the best band in the world, Wilco or Weezer?"

"Fuck Henry Rollins — always tryin' to scare people with his neck and shit! I'll take that motherfucker on any day, you can tell him I said that too!"

"Joan Jett? My brother is a better guitarist than her. Hell, your brother is a better guitarist than her."

"Yo La Tengo? A critic, a chick and a fat guy? You call that a rock band?"

"We've been around for 20 years. That's longer than Sonic Youth. You guys like Sonic Youth? Sonic Youth worships at the altar of Guided By Voices! You guys like Superchunk? Superchunk worships at the altar of Guided By Voices. You guys like Sebadoh? [About three people cheer] See, they don't worship at the altar of Guided By Voices and nobody knows who they are!"

"We're better than The Cars, we're better than The Police... Wait, we're not better than The Cars. But we're still beter than The Police."

"Finally got it right. We fucked up that ending the last three times we did it. We like to appear to be tight — we ain't tight. We like to appear to look good — we don't look good. You might think we might smell good — not happenin'. You'd like to think we practice once in a while. Fuck practice. Dude, we don't practice. You know bands that practice all the time? That's pussy."