Henry Rollins

Founded the record labels InfiniteZero, 213CD, and more recently, the "District Line" label, which will focus on rare and unreleased music from Washington DC area artists.

Founder of 2.13.61, a record label and publishing company. The digits of the companys name are Henrys date of birth (February 13, 1961).

Sang in early hardcore punk band Black Flag.

Started working out as an underclassman at the Bullis School at the suggestion of a history teacher and Vietnam veteran. He got his first workout equipment from Sears and was told to not look in the mirror. When he finally did several months later, "it was a huge revelation" as hed been a scrawny youth that was frequently picked on and didnt stand up for himself. In tenth grade, he defended himself and ultimately hospitalized a senior. Though he still feels other students regarded him as a freak, he wasnt teased as much.

In December of 1991, in their shared house in Venice, California, his best friend Joe Cole (son of actor Dennis Cole ) was shot and killed during a robbery attempt. The crime remains unsolved and was featured on "Unsolved Mysteries" .

Lives off Hollywood Blvd in the Hollywood foothills, California.

Among the musical artists he admires least: Depeche Mode , Bruce Springsteen and U2 (which he says has the worst rhythm section hes ever heard).

Has a multi-tiered career: sings, acts, writes books and poetry, does spoken word performances, runs his own record label and book publishing company, and now also TV film critic, and radio DJ.

Despises the music of Nine Inch Nails and Moby (and most electronics-based musical artists in general).

Won a Grammy in 1994 for Best Spoken Word Album for "Get in the Van: On the Road with Black Flag", the same year he was nominated for Best Heavy Metal Performance for "Liar"

He took the stage name of Rollins shortly after joining Black Flag. The name came from notes exchanged between friend Ian MacKaye and himself when they were teenagers. The notes typically contained fake threats that were signed by a mystery character named "Rollins".

Collaborated with William Shatner on a song on Shatners album "Has Been". The song was entitled "I Cant Get Behind That".

In 2010, he traveled to such places as Senegal, Mali, Ireland, China, North Korea, Mongolia, Tibet, Nepal, Bhutan, Vietnam, the United Arab Emirates, Uganda, and South Sudan.

Made a cameo in the video game Def Jam Fight for NY as the owner of the gym and the guy you go to for new moves.

(October 2002) Hosting the construction/competition game show "Full Metal Challenge" on The Learning Channel.

(May 2004) Hosts a weekly radio show, "Harmony in My Head," on Indie 103.1 FM in Los Angeles, CA.

(December 2004) On Saturday, December 4, at midnight, Henrys Film Corner, his new monthly film show will begin on the IFC Channel.

(December 2004) Hosting "Henrys Film Corner" - a monthly film review/interview show on Independent Film Channel.

(December 2004) Departing for Afghanistan, for his fourth USO Tour this year.

When you start to doubt yourself the real world will eat you alive.

Want a good body? Work at it. Want to be a success? Work at it. Want to,be truly exceptional? Be a touch insane . . . You need a little bit of,insanity to do great things.

Nothing brings people together more than a mutual hatred.

Australia, New Zealand. Sometimes Japan. And the odd date in Singapore.

You are beautiful like demolition. Just the thought of you draws my knuckles white. I don’t need a god. I have you and your beautiful mouth, your hands holding onto me, the nails leaving unfelt wounds, your hot breath on my neck. The taste of your saliva. The darkness is ours. The nights belong to us. Everything we do is secret. Nothing we do will ever be understood; we will be feared and kept well away from. It will be the stuff of legend, endless discussion and limitless inspiration for the brave of heart. It’s you and me in this room, on this floor. Beyond life, beyond morality. We are gleaming animals painted in moonlit sweat glow. Our eyes turn to jewels and everything we do is an example of spontaneous perfection. I have been waiting all my life to be with you. My heart slams against my ribs when I think of the slaughtered nights I spent all over the world waiting to feel your touch. The time I annihilated while I waited like a man doing a life sentence. Now you’re here and everything we touch explodes, bursts into bloom or burns to ash. History atomizes and negates itself with our every shared breath. I need you like life needs life. I want you bad like a natural disaster. You are all I see. You are the only one I want to know.

Love heals scars love left,Scar tissue is stronger than regular tissue. Realize the strength, move on.

I used to love youI still doSo SelfishI love the old youThe you that didnt shoot drugs. . . The you that didnt get beat on by menYou laugh in my face and call me a foolBut its trueI still love youSometimes,I can see the old youWhen your eyes flashWhen you almost look alive,There is nothing like being told to go fuck yourself by the same person who was, only days before, praying on your behalf.

It hurts to let go. Sometimes it seems the harder you try to hold on to something or someone the more it wants to get away. You feel like some kind of criminal for having felt, for having wanted. For having wanted to be wanted.

She liked me because she said that we both hated everything and knew that friendship was an act of desperation. She said that for a man I was alright. She said that people were half-way and if it was up to her a lot of people would get killed and a lot of men would be walking around without their balls. She said that they should go on sale for women to hang off their rearview mirrors.

A rose trapped inside a fist.

I think about the meaning of pain. Pain is personal. It really belongs to the one feeling it. Probably the only thing that is your own. I like mine.

Yeah, that’s my experience. Humbling to the point where you have major regrets about some of the stupid things you said, some of the things you thought were right. You keep going to these countries, and it’s like, you forgot the lesson from the last time. Because the first person you encounter kind of bitch-slaps you upside the head in the most wonderful, innocent way and you realize, God, I’m still an asshole. And this guy, by doing nothing except being broke and so incredibly polite—it takes you aback, you realize, I’m still not there yet. I still have like eight miles to go before I can even get into the parking lot of humility. I have to keep going back. It’s like going back to a chiropractor to get a readjustment. That’s me in Africa, that’s me in Southeast Asia. You come back humbled and you bring that into your life. It’s made me much more tolerant of other peoples—and I’m not saying I used to be a misogynist, or I used to be a racist, that was never my problem. But I can be extremely headstrong, impatient, rude. Like, “Hurry up, man. What’s your problem? Get out of my way. ” That sentiment comes easy to me. Going to these countries, you realize none of that is necessary, none of it’s cool, it’s nothing Abraham Lincoln would do, and so why are you doing it? Those are the lessons I’ve learned.

Loneliness adds beauty to life. It puts a special burn on sunsets and makes night air smell better.

Everything you do makes my body scream with loneliness. When I see you, the room swallows me. I find myself at the bottom of the pool.

Yes, I guess you could say I am a loner, but i feel more lonely in a crowded room with boring people then i feel on my owm.

Do you ever get the feeling that when you show someone your affection for them, you are assaulting them? Like you should probably leave them alone? Your affection, no matter how sincere, does not necessarily mean a damn thing to the person you are giving it to. Love can corner you. When you intrude on someone with your affection, you might find yourself trying to knock a strong door down with your shoulder. Either you break the door or you break yourself. Something almost always gets broken. In my mind it runs like this: I’m going to like you, whether you like it or not. I’ll wear you down until you relent and swallow this big lie I have for you. Don’t move. Don’t live. I love you.

They left like you knew they would. They went away and you fell like a stone. All the way to the bottom of your room. I see you, yes I see you. Sitting in your chair, hating every minute of it. Falling like a stone without even moving. It hurt you to know that you were right about all the shit you wanted to be wrong about. They always leave you. You put yourself in the right place to get left.

At some point they show their true colorsAfter the break upAfter the trial After the contract is signed and brokenTheir true colors stinkThese daysI find it hard to get along with themI want to push them until the colors come out And sometimes I hate them so much, I push and seeI do the same to the ones I likeThe ones I don’t care about I smile at real nice,How memories lie to us. How time coats the ordinary with gold. How it breaks the heart to go back and attempt to re-live them. How crushed we are when we discover that the gold was merely gold-plating thinly coated over lead, chalk and peeling paint.

I get tired of talking when I want to be silent.

The material you work with is that which you will come to resemble. That which you work against will always work against you, including yourself.

My optimism wears heavy boots and is loud.

You always know the mark of a coward. A coward hides behind freedom. A brave person stands in front of freedom and defends it for others.

For some there is no musicNo lightsNo fireNo untamed madness that breathes lifeThere is workAnguishFrustrationRageDespairA dullness that rings like wooden thunder,You are beautiful like demolition. Just the thought of you draws my knuckles white. I don’t need a god. I have you and your beautiful mouth, your hands holding onto me, the nails leaving unfelt wounds, your hot breath on my neck. The taste of your saliva. The darkness is ours. The nights belong to us. Everything we do is secret. Nothing we do will ever be understood; we will be feared and kept well away from. . . It’s you and me in this room, on this floor. Beyond life, beyond morality. We are gleaming animals painted in moonlit sweat glow. Our eyes turn to jewels and everything we do is an example of spontaneous perfection. I have been waiting all my life to be with you. My heart slams against my ribs when I think of the slaughtered nights I spent all over the world waiting to feel your touch. The time I annihilated while I waited like a man doing a life sentence. Now you’re here and everything we touch explodes, bursts into bloom or burns to ash. History atomizes and negates itself with our every shared breath. I need you like life needs life. I want you bad like a natural disaster. You are all I see. You are the only one I want to know.

You need a little bit of insanity to do great things.

In my world there would be as many public libraries as there are Starbucks.

Everything I do, writing, touring, travelling, it all comes from the punk and hardcore attitude, from that expression - from being open to try things but relying on yourself, taking what you have into the battle and making of it what you will, hoping you can figure it out as you go. Make some sense of it.

I believe that one defines oneself by reinvention. To not be like your parents. To not be like your friends. To be yourself. To cut yourself out of stone.

I once asked Ozzy Osbourne, truly one of my favorite people in the world, if he was cool with singing Black Sabbath songs year after year, whether he was performing with Black Sabbath or out on a solo tour. He said it was great.

America was cool with Saddam Hussein when he was killing Iranians.

Most Americans are very cool people.

I am not immune to the lure of a signed record, flier or set list. The fact that your music heroes potentially had, in their own hands, the record you now have in yours is kind of cool. When the musician has departed, it can give the thing a unique power.

Now and then, someone is able to look at an empty space, conclude it would be a great place to start a revolution, and bravely go forward.

When a young non-white male is stopped and searched at the whim of a police officer, his idea of personal space, privacy and self esteem are shattered, to say nothing of his Fourth and Fourteenth Amendment protections. The damage goes deep quickly and stays. Stop & frisk, as well as a tactic, is also an incitement.

I tend to gravitate to the darkest or most obscure part of any venue in an effort to have my own space to experience the music on my own, free from unwanted conversations and other distractions.

I am a veteran of the War on Christmas. I am just emerging from a battlefield strewn with dead trees and torn shreds of brightly colored wrapping paper.

Every year, August lashes out in volcanic fury, rising with the din of morning traffic, its great metallic wings smashing against the ground, heating the air with ever-increasing intensity.

I think the U. K. is an amazing place and has been extremely good to me. Some of my favorite and most-listened-to bands are from England. I have met many good people there and have been in front of some of the most loyal audiences I have ever encountered.

Being in New York is an almost overwhelming experience. While Washington, D. C.

is my favorite American city, I regard New York City as the most amazing city in the world. No other comes close. It is an incredible, inexhaustible engine.

It is amazing to hear grown-up people rationalize homophobia and discrimination. The lengths they go to trying to prove their points take reason to its breaking point.

I think self-reliance and self-responsibility and self-accountability will help you as a parent, a teacher, as a citizen as a friend.

I find it takes a lot of strength to endure myself.

I have not the smarts or patience for political office.

Marriage equality is a term so ridiculous on its face that when you hear it mentioned, you would think you were in Riyadh. Years from now, perhaps we can lose the equality part, the same-sex part and call it what it is - marriage.

Each year, every city in the world that can should have a multiday festival. More people meeting each other, digging new types of music, new foods, new ideas. You want to stop having so many wars? This could be a step in the right direction.

Musicians should not play music. Music should play musicians.

I spend several days at a time without enough sleep. At first, normal activities become annoying. When you are too tired to eat, you really need some sleep. A few days later, things become strange. Loud noises become louder and more startling, familiar sounds become unfamiliar, and life reinvents itself as a surrealist dream.

I think more tolerance, more people having more access to a chance to be literate, and a chance to stay healthy makes for a more peaceful planet.

When I read that Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 had disappeared - a state-of-the-art Boeing 777, said to be an incredibly safe way to travel - I waited patiently for the chance to learn what happened.

The first several years of my life were used to upload incredible amounts of fear, and I just became afraid of everything. I was afraid of my parents, afraid of my classmates, afraid of the streets of Washington, D. C. I would flinch at every gesture.

Sometimes the truth hurts. And sometimes it feels real good.

I think young people should travel and travel often to other countries. . . like I do.

I just travel the world with my backpack and my cameras and a bunch of Clif bars.

The Bad Seeds are a band I will travel a great distance to see whenever possible.

Jazz music is as American as it gets, and so is the U. S. Postal Service. A Miles Davis stamp is a perfect marriage of two great American institutions.

Of course same sex marriage is constitutional! The right to be yourself, to pursue life, liberty, and property, is protected several ways over several amendments. John Boehner should know this.

I think marriage is a boring and fault-ridden contractual obligation.

There is not one single police officer in America that I am not afraid of and not one that I would trust to tell the truth or obey the laws they are sworn to uphold. I do not believe they protect me in any way.

August used to be a sad month for me. As the days went on, the thought of school starting weighed heavily upon my young frame. That, coupled with the oppressive heat and humidity of my native Washington, D. C.

only seemed to heighten the misery.

War is very sad and small life is pathetically fragile at times.

The history of apartheid-era South Africa is incredibly sad and at times infuriatingly incomprehensible.

With any advent in technology, any technological innovation, there is the good and the bad.

While I have no empirical evidence to back this up, I bet that the number of homosexual people per thousand has not fluctuated all that much over the centuries. I do not believe the dented wisdom my father used to extol, that homosexuality was a sure sign of a civilization in decline.

I am an optimist because I want to change things for the better and I know that blood has to be spilled and disharmony and cruelty are necessary to do that.

Yes, I guess you could say I am a loner, but I feel more lonely in a crowed room with boring people than I feel on my own.

Weakness is what brings ignorance, cheapness, racism, homophobia, desperation, cruelty, brutality, all these things that will keep a society chained to the ground, one foot nailed to the floor. .