When I see an entire community disenfranchised, it disturbs me. Not that I'm a message guy, per se. I write about people. I like to write about human beings, not crap political rhetoric. I've tried to avoid that all my life. When I wrote about soldiers in Vietnam, I wasn't trying to make a political statement. I was trying to write about how screwed things were for soldiers, and how they still are.

Remember how I found you there alone in your electric chair, I told you dirty jokes until you smiled.

No end to sorrow, caused by the same endless fears. Why can't we learn from all we've been through after two thousand years?

I work with musicians whose opinions I respect and if they don't like something they don't hold back. They'll say, 'That really sucks' and 'You've lost it' and 'You're no good anymore.' And I crawl away with my tail between my legs and I fear that kind of ridicule, but I want them to like the music I'm bringing to them.

I've crashed my car three times.

I was drawn to boxing because I got beat up as a kid. I was the kid with the piano books in a New York neighbourhood.

Why do musicians give so much time to charitable causes? The most humanitarian cause that we can give our time to is the creation and performance of music itself.