I'm a compulsive musician, but it's also a bloody good way out of having to do anything else.

Since the age of 12, all my musical thinking has been influenced by Afro-American music.

When I reflect on how things have changed, I can't help but laugh.

If the same phrase in the same place created the right effect, I was perfectly prepared to use it every time. I wasn't worried that I wasn't improvising.

I wanted to be able to play guitar. I wanted to be able to make music hurt.

Every musical movement that is big enough has to produce some good musicians who wouldn't have had the incentive to start playing without it.

The British feel of blues has been hard, rather than emotional. Far too much emphasis on 12 bar, too little attention to words, far too little originality.