Jack White quotes:

This generation is so dead. You ask a kid, 'What are you doing this Saturday?' and they'll be playing video games or watching cable, instead of building model cars or airplanes or doing something creative. Kids today never say, 'Man, I'm really into remote-controlled steamboats.'

I think that sometimes love gets in the way of itself - you know, love interrupts itself. We want things so much that we sabotage them.

That's what happens nowadays with people working on computers. They can so easily fix things with their mouse and take out all the, 'Oh, somebody coughed in the background; we need to take that out' - or somebody hit a bad note. Those are all the best moments.

I dabbled in things like Howlin' Wolf, Cream and Led Zeppelin, but when I heard Son House and Robert Johnson, it blew my mind. It was something I'd been missing my whole life. That music made me discard everything else and just get down to the soul and honesty of the blues.

With the White Stripes we were trying to trick people into not realising we were playing the blues. We did not want to come off like white kids trying to play black music from 100 years ago so a great way to distract them was by dressing in red, white and black.

I consider music to be storytelling, melody and rhythm. A lot of hip-hop has broken music down. There are no instruments and no songwriting. So you're left with just storytelling and rhythm. And the storytelling can be so braggadocious, you're just left with rhythm.

I think it takes a lot of trickery to keep up with the media and its perception of you. I don't know if I have it in me most of the time to care. The music is made first, and the interviews or photos to keep it alive come later as a necessary evil, I suppose.

We have a secret project at Third Man where we want to have the first vinyl record played in outer space. We want to launch a balloon that carries a vinyl record player.

I was in a Montessori school. There was a drum circle with all the kids passing around a little bongo drum. I was the last person in the circle, and when it got to me I played 'Shave and a Haircut, Two Bits' - in front of all the parents. Blew the crowd away at five years old.

Your attitude is more important than the events happening around you. Artists develop a syndrome taught in art schools. It is a malady titled, 'Artistic Temperament'... rudeness, excuses, slovenliness, laziness, clutter, addictions, non-commercial attitudes, un-professionalism... and a good reason for failure.

I've always felt it's ridiculous to say, of any of the females in my life: You're my friend, you're my wife, you're my girlfriend, you're my co-worker. This is your box, and you're not allowed to stray outside of it.

I have three dads: my biological father, God and Bob Dylan.

A lot of people in the media, and some everyday people, really aren't in search of the truth. They're in search of something worse than that. Money, yeah. I think the media's the kind of a thing where the truth doesn't win, because it's no fun. The truth's no fun.

I really don't like to take the easy way out, if I can help it, on anything I do, I like to really make it a challenge. I don't know how to create by taking the easy routes. I've tried, you know, I've tried to let myself, but I always struggle to compensate.

Well, as a songwriter, it's really dangerous to use the word love in a song. It's a word that has been used in songs so many millions of times before, and it's the most popular topic to ever write about.

I know that's blasphemous when you are from Detroit, but I was never a fan of Motown stuff. I don't care for the production much.

I think you can't really escape any kind of spiritual education as a child, whether it's New Age or Judaism or Buddhism or whatever it is. You can't escape it, even if you completely disagree with it, you still have it as a foundation that you base things off of.

An auctioneer is such a uniquely American thing. I keep thinking in my head, perhaps it's not as American as I think, but it feels so Southern. It feels so American. Like, hundreds of years of American tradition is involved in it.

If you have twenty guys in the room and you just bring in one girl, you change the entire mood and everyone plays different.

Smart art galleries know it's not the words on paper but the emotion in the piece that makes clients pull out the credit card or check book. The gallery's number one concern is will this stuff sell? What your bio, artist's statement or resume articulates will be of no help if you don't make art that connects with buyers.

I want love to roll me over slowly stick a knife inside me, and twist it all around.... I want love to walk right up and bite me grab a hold of me and fight me leave me dying on the ground.

I keep guitars that are, you know, the neck's a little bit bent and it's a little bit out of tune. I want to work and battle it and conquer it and make it express whatever attitude I have at that moment. I want it to be a struggle.

The Guinness book is a very elitist organization. There's nothing scientific about what they do. They just have an office full of people who decide what is a record and what isn't.

My mother was 45 when she had me, so when I was in high school my parents were the same age as my friends' grandparents.

People aren't buying records like they used to, so it's nice to try to figure out a way to make them do it. I would enjoy the same thing to own an old movie house, to try to trick people to come in - like having 3-D or Smell-o-Vision or Vibra-Vision or something. Mcguffins to get people interested.

The fact that we elected Obama was a sign that the black struggle inherent in the blues and so much of the music I have loved can triumph.

I have so much music inside me I'm just trying to stay afloat. I don't tend to write for a particular band - you have to just write the songs and then let God into the room and let the music tell you what to do.

I've always loved the word blunderbuss. I've always thought that it was a beautiful word and that it could mean several different things.

We were like a white family from the 1920s or something. My parents had this bizarre, different way of looking at things from the people that surrounded us. I went to an all-Mexican grade school and an all-black high school, and not many people in those places liked the same stuff as me.

I don't think there is room for 'artistic temperament.' Professional artists understand art is a business. If businesses ran their companies like many artists do their careers, they would not stay open a year.

It is a myth that art has to be sold. It is not like stocking a grocery store where people fill a pushcart. Art is a product that has no apparent need. The salesperson builds the need in the mind of the buyer.

I've always worked to find really deep meaning of song and also at the same time having it covered in sugar, so it can be taken two or three different ways.

Well, I sort of don't trust anybody who doesn't like Led Zeppelin.

I wanted to be able to talk with people who have trade jobs and make records with them. I want to do more records with carpenters, electricians, people who specialize in even more bizarre trades that are off the beaten path.

The bottom line is we must get off our duff and make an effort to succeed. Trust me on this, when you see someone successful in any of the arts they have been willing to make an extra effort.

If you saw me working with construction crews or graphic designers, you'd see how much I'm really hoping for them to bring something to the table and let God in the room and let things happen naturally.

Great work comes from great joy. Leave the angst for the movies; do art - that is fun.

I'm always afraid, because I do most of my stuff at home, where nobody bothers me, and I don't have to stroke somebody's ego or be careful about hurting someone's feelings. But I also want to know that I can still go into the world and be with other people and make music.

I love him (Muse) too much, and you can't hurt someone that you love that much . . . unless you're family.

Maybe we should all just listen to records and quit our jobs

Life is simple unless we find a way to make it complicated.

When you put something out there into the world, there's all these words you don't want to hear, that you hope people don't say. I don't like anything that starts with 're' - like retro, reinvent, recreate - I hate that. It's always like living in the past - copying, emulating.

I've always been making up my own restrictions for myself, from day one, and it's compelling, because it forces me to think. That's always been a driving force for me.

The true professional makes art when he is not feeling good, if the studio is too cold or too warm or the walls are falling down. We are painters and we paint. If I were a sculptor, I'd sculpt.

Jesus Christ, is this an NPR convention?

Captain Lone Wolf Gonzaullas was one of a kind. I'm sure he would agree to this truth, If you continuously compete with others, you will become bitter. If you constantly compete with yourself, you can become great.

Some people consider the way Shakespeare was writing about Ophelia as erotomania-that she was delusional in thinking that Hamlet was in love with her. But I don't think so.

The main things to rebel against - over-production, too much technology, overthinking. It's a spoiled mentality; everything is too easy. If you want to record a song, you can buy Pro Tools and record four hundred guitar tracks. That leads to overthinking, which kills any spontaneity and the humanity of the performance.

I say this often, THINK. There is something in life called common sense. Webster's says common sense is sound and prudent judgment based on a simple perception of the situation or facts. Perhaps this is why in 1776, Thomas Paine used these words as a title for the most famous pamphlet ever written.

I want to be part of the resurgence of things that are tangible, beautiful and soulful, rather than just give in to the digital age. But when I talk to people about this they just say, 'Yeah, I know what you mean,' and stare at their mobiles.

Vinyl is the real deal. I've always felt like, until you buy the vinyl record, you don't really own the album. And it's not just me or a little pet thing or some kind of retro romantic thing from the past. It is still alive.

We don't have to live up to the expectations of others. Passion is personal. As long as our passion is fueled with the right stuff then keep on plodding forward. I'll never be Mark Twain or Tom Clancy. But that's okay, because neither of them could teach you to mix a boundless number of grays, or where to place the catch light in a portrait.

Mastery is the rudder, Mystery is the sail and Magic the wind to move you in your chosen direction.

I think the sensitivity that you need to create certain things sometimes would spill over into things that shouldn't have bothered me.

When I say nothing, I say everything

Music is what I have to do, I only answer the questions so that I can do it.

It's hard for me to play seated theaters because people tend to sit down and get a little bit complacent, so it's less energy. It's just very dry and dead. People start to feel like they're watching a movie. The environment when they walk into it, it's not standing room only, smoking and drinking and rock 'n' roll. So it's a little bit dangerous to do that.

The secret is planning your work and working your plan. If you don't know where you are going, how will you know when you arrive? You can't stumble upon your destination.

For new bands, I think a major label is the safest place to be. Independent labels are the ones getting away with murder. A lot of them are hobbyists who rip-off young bands, taking advantage of people who would never get signed to a major.

From now on take time to be amazing, tell those who matter, I LOVE YOU.

Failure comes when we don't get back up and try again.

I'd make a White Stripes record right now. I'd be in the White Stripes for the rest of my life. That band is the most challenging, important, fulfilling thing ever to happen to me. I wish it was still here. It's something I really, really miss.

Playing drums feels like coming home for me. Even during the White Stripes I thought: 'I'll do this for now, but I'm really a drummer.' That's what I'll put on my passport application.

I'm excited by the band [White Stripes]. It really excites me. But it wouldn't excite me if there weren't those limitations, if we weren't living in that box, if we weren't trapped. Once that goes away, then I'll know that it's not worth doing it any more.

I just think old old movies, they make you concentrate and pay attention so much more. They feel so warm. A lot of modern digital videotape, it's just too bright. Don't know why, it's not warm.

Some people remaster their records six, seven times, remix it three, four times, spend a million hours, then they always go back and hear a demo of it and they'll say, 'Aw that sounds so much better than the final mix.'

I came up from growing up with a lot of Catholic guilt, a lot of punk rock, hipster guilt in the later years where I think people have thrown a lot of things on me. Where I always felt like I'm not supposed to tell the horn section what to play or I don't want to come off egotistical.

There's Catholic guilt about things, then there's the guilt of being the youngest of 10, so when nice things happen to you, you're not really allowed to enjoy them.

The way I like to start a new project is to take a cover song and make a stab at it, ideally one that has nothing to do with the people in the room.

There aren't that many things left that haven't already been done, especially with music. I'm interested in ideas that can shake us all up.

If you want to put out a million CDs and sell them and get them played on the radio, and even videos, or whatever, if that still exists, that kind of muscle can only come from a label like Columbia.

I would never purposely sing a song about someone I love, I wouldn't want to embarrass them. But for someone I don't like... I would definitely do that.

I grew up in the 90s in the time of grunge when if you didn't go on stage in jeans and a T shirt you weren't 'real.' That seemed ridiculous to me.

My mother's the youngest of 10 children too, so we have sort of a special bond in that we know what that feels like. It's a strange spot to be in.

I don't feel very good about myself. People always leave me. Nobody can stand me for very long. I wish I could cut my tongue out, or take out the part of my brain that has opinions. Or cares. I wish I could be simple. Be quiet, introverted, or shy. I'm half way in between a wallflower at a party and Elvis Presley. People love one or the other. In between is no place to be.

Many days you will want to give up because of rejections and failures. Passion to be an artist will help you prevail where others fail.

Passion is the breath we take, the water we drink to sustain ourselves. Without air and water we perish; without passion an artist will wither and blow away.

Sometimes you just get in there and force yourself to work, and maybe something good will come out, ya know? Deadlines and things make you creative. Opportunity and telling yourself you have all the time in the world, all the money in the world, all the colors in the palette, anything you want-that just kills creativity.

I gave myself over to music and art a long time ago, so I don't get to relax and I don't get to sit still. The best I can do is constantly create my own environment so it benefits what I need to accomplish in the next step.

I won't let love disrupt, corrupt, or interrupt me.

If you're doing something that people want, they'll find you.

No. I know that's blasphemous when you are from Detroit.

I'm one of those people that you have to keep your eye on or I'll wander off into the woods and forget to come back.

Telling yourself you have all the time in the world, all the colors in the palette, that just kills creativity.

It is the pursuit of happiness that brings us happiness, and not the happiness achieved.

Our art is an adventure. It is a dream come true.

Inspiration and work ethic - they ride right next to each other.

Do not trust people who call themselves musicians or record collectors who say that they don't like Bob Dylan or the Beatles. They do not love music if those words come out of their mouths.

I trust no one who hasn't time for music.

There have been three times. Once I got in a car accident and shattered my finger. A few years ago I didn't feel like being alive. That's all I can say.

If you don't have a struggle inside or around you, you have to make one up.

Deadlines and things make you creative.

A songwriter's heart is pure when they have the desire to keep digging deeper into music. And invariably, when you dig deeper it always leads you into the past.

Relationships of any kind are powerful, and they always influence an artist. It's inescapable.

You can't do better than that.

Can there be enough books to answer all your questions?

I cannot judge what motivates people. We are all moved by one of four things or a combination of these four things: money, romance, recognition or survival.

You hear a lot of people, they turn 40 and it really bugs them and they get depressed or whatever. I don't know - I just don't feel that way. I feel 19 years old all the time. I mean, it's not a lie. I could easily say, God, I feel 70. Or maybe I seem like I'm 70 or 200 or something to other people, I don't know. My brain feels 19 all the time. And that's a good spot.

Success is having a career that you love with every fiber in your body.

Fifteen minutes of fame doesn't make a career. An article in a magazine, newspaper, interview on television or multiple print ads may stroke your ego, but nothing much else. An artist's career is a lifetime venture. Just because an artist is on top doesn't mean they are sheltered from a crash. As has been stated, the higher you climb, the harder you fall.

The only person who is hurt by jealousy is you... Eliminate that word from your life... it may not make you unsuccessful selling your art, but it will destroy your happiness.

I've always felt it's ridiculous to say, of any of the females in my life: You're my friend, you're my wife, you're my girlfriend, you're my co-worker. 'This is your box, and you're not allowed to stray outside of it.'

I didn't really even think of recording under my own name for a long time. I thought, 'I've got the rest of my life to do that.

I never wanted to play guitar when I was younger. I wanted to be a drummer because everybody plays guitar, and I didn't want to do what everybody else wanted to do.

Nashville has always felt perfect. I don't think Third Man Records could exist in any other town that I know of in America. Anything smaller or larger than the size of Nashville, and also the music - the attention that's paid to music in that town is sort of the right kind. It's not too hipster and it's not too fake; it's something in the middle, which is really good ground for a place like Third Man Records, that aims to be genre-less. It's great to be able to have that kind of access.

There are distractions, all around. There's so much media, for a young kid to battle against, to get to something soulful. You have to make a decision, on your own, what you can take from these people, if you can dig deeper. It's nice to be able to let people dig deeper.

It's a sound bite. It's very of this age, because that's what people want.

It's harder to put yourself in a place where you could easily be seen as a fake. But that's more interesting to me.

Worry means tormenting yourself with disturbing thoughts or fretting about things we have zero control over. If you live in the north there is no need to worry about the snow. You will get plenty each year. If you live in California or Texas you needn't worry about rain because we won't receive any.

Luck is when preparation meets opportunity. I'll share the formula I learned while forging my way forward as a full-time painter for forty-four years. The steps all break down to one simple sentence: Make art that connects with enough folks for you to earn a splendid living.

The secret of a successful art career is to make more art that folks think they need than pieces they just want. When a piece of art emotionally connects with a person the work becomes a need. You are then on your way to becoming successful.

You want to figure out how you want to play the guitar; what your niche would be. Well you just start digging deeper. When you're digging deeper in rock and roll you're on a freight train heading straight for the blues.

It is not the style but the quality and emotional impact of work that makes it marketable. Unless we make art that connects with people, we won't sell much, no matter what the style or subject.

The biggest failures come round and spring ultimate surprises of survival.

I always stayed away from the studio environment as much as possible. But I just wanted to see if I could work in one. It's not easy. Just having an engineer's assistant around is enough for me to be uncomfortable. With more than one person there in the room, it feels strange.

In my bands, I don't really walk around telling people what to play, just out of respect really. I mean, if there's something I feel in my gut, I'll bring it up.

I certainly wouldn't want a song that I'd already written to be used on a commercial. That seems strange.

Nowadays, everybody assumes, when the wake up in the morning, if they have a question, it will get answered. Because they have the internet. No matter what the question is, someone will answer their question.

I dislike the word 'emerging artist.' Emerging connotes to me an alligator coming up from the water. I consider all artists to be artists, not rising, emerging, amateur, beginning, but the real thing.

Happiness is more important than money any day.