Memphis Quotes

• That was the big thing when I was growing up, singing on the radio. The extent of my dream was to sing on the radio station in Memphis. Even when I got out of the Air Force in 1954, I came right back to Memphis and started knocking on doors at the radio station.

  Johnny Cash

  Dream, Growing Up, Air

  "Music's Man in Black". Academy of Achievement interview, www.achievement.org. June 25, 1993.

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• God bless the boys from Memphis, blue suede shoes, and Elvis.

  George Jones

  Boys, Shoes, Blue

  Song: Who's Gonna Fill Their Shoes

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• Memphis is in a very lucky position on the map. Everything just gravitated to Memphis for years.

  Steve Cropper

  Years, Lucky, Maps

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• I'll stay in Memphis.

  Elvis Presley

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• Growing up in Memphis and listening to all kinds of music and dreaming... So that was one of the first times I wrote a complete song and set it to music and the whole bit. From then on, I was busy with it.

  William Bell

  Dream, Song, Growing Up

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• When I got outta High School I was driving a truck. I was just a poor boy from Memphis, Memphis.

  Elvis Presley

  School, Boys, Boots

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• Walking in Memphis, I was walking with my feet ten feet off of Beale. Walking in Memphis, but do I really feel the way I feel?

  Marc Cohn

  Travel, Feet, Way

  Song: Walking In Memphis, Album: Marc Cohn

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• The city of Memphis has demonstrated that neither character nor standing avails the Negro if he dares to protect himself against the white man or become his rival.

  Ida B. Wells

  Character, Men, White Man

  Ida B. Wells (2013). “Crusade for Justice: The Autobiography of Ida B. Wells”, p.52, University of Chicago Press

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• I sang in church growing up. Memphis is the blues capital of the world, we like to say.

  Justin Timberlake

  Growing Up, Church, World

  Justin Timberlake, Susan Black (2003). “Justin Timberlake”, Omnibus Press& Schirmer Trade Books

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• The many sounds of Memphis shaped my early musical career and continue to be an inspiration to this day.

  Justin Timberlake

  Inspiration, Careers, Musical

  "For the record: quick news on distributed, o-tow, Guns N'Roses, Madonna, Simple Plan, Jack Johnson & more", www.mtv.com. November 07, 2003.

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• I was always drawn to the roots music, bluegrass, blues, early rock - Sun Records, Elvis [Presley]. And I still love that music to this day. Memphis never gets the credit. It's much more musically rich than Nashville ever will be. Nashville manufactured that hokey-hillbilly image way back.

  Steve Young

  Nashville, Roots, Rocks

  Interview with Gordon Ames, www.outlawmagazine.com. May 2, 2012.

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• I used to go down every year for the remembrance of Elvis' birthday. Memphis State College invited me to sit in the auditorium and speak to the people for one of those Elvis days.

  Otis Blackwell

  Birthday, Redneck, College

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• My parents were working in a hospital in Memphis. But I didn't live there for any length of time that I remember. The first thing I remember is the town in Mississippi that I live in now, Charleston.

  Morgan Freeman

  Parent, Firsts, Towns

  "New Again: Morgan Freeman". Interview with Graham Fuller, www.interviewmagazine.com. February 10, 2016.

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• Man, that record came out and was real big in Memphis. They started playing it, and it got real big. Don't know why-the lyrics had no meaning.

  Elvis Presley

  Real, Men, Records

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• When I came out of the military, I had a club in Memphis and I started using the The Bar Kays as my club band. They were still only in the middle school - but I'd take them on the road with me on the weekends, sometimes.

  William Bell

  Military, School, Weekend

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• The Faces do not, as some have recently alleged, play badly. They are more than competent, especially at creating a mid-Sixties Rolling Stones-styled groove, as their excellent version of 'Memphis' proves.

  Jon Landau

  Play, Creating, Rolling

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• Judging from what looks like the popularity of this classic wrestling show is that the people like what they have grown to know and love here in Memphis

  Jerry Lawler

  Wrestling, People, Judging

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• I spent a few years here in Memphis, in the late '70s and early '80s, where I was studying a lot of country blues players and their styles. So it seems like every record I'll do, I will appropriate these blues styles that I remember.

  Alex Chilton

  Country, Player, Years

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• The first time I saw my wife, Marjorie, I was doing stand-up in Memphis, and she was sitting in the front row. Afterward, I walked up and said, "Ma'am, I'm going to marry you one day". And 15 years later, I did.

  Steve Harvey

  Relationship, Success, Faith

  "Biography/ Personal Quotes". www.imdb.com.

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• She would go to Memphis and this was after our divorce. And I would send her to Memphis to be with him.

  Priscilla Presley

  Divorce

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• I hitchhiked, took trucks 'n' trains - anything that would pick me up. I stopped in Memphis for about six months and they found me and come got me. Stayed about a month an' split again.

  John Lee Hooker

  Pick Me Up, Six, Splits

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• A friend of mine took me to Memphis advised me that I should get in the musicians' union. He gave me a set of drums and said, Stay on the job, son.

  Levon Helm

  Jobs, Son, Musician

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• Most studios in Memphis had a house set of drums; the drummers just brought their own sticks.

  Steve Cropper

  House, Sticks, Drummer

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• I get called 'Memphis Eve,' but my first name is Eve. I know Memphis is in there somewhere, but on my passport I'm 'Eve Sunny Day Hewson.

  Eve Hewson

  Names, Firsts, Sunny Day

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• I'd been to Memphis before, but we stayed out of Memphis early on in the late 70s for obvious reasons. People were very sensitive about Elvis Presley, and my stage name obviously would be provocative to some people in that area at that time.

  Elvis Costello

  Names, People, Would Be

  "Interview about The Delivery Man". Interview with Brian Wise, www.elviscostello.info. April 10, 2004.

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