Some of the old folk singers used to phrase things in an interesting way, and then, I got my style from seeing a lot of outdoor-type poets, who would recite their poetry. When you don't have a guitar, you recite things differently, and there used to be quite a few poets in the jazz clubs, who would recite with a different type of attitude.

How many years can some people exist before they're allowed to be free.

People talk about Frank Sinatra all the time - and they should talk about Frank - but he had the greatest arrangers. They worked for him in a different kind of way than they worked for other people. They gave him arrangements that are just sublime on every level. And he, of course, could match that because he had this ability to get inside of the song in a sort of a conversational way. Frank sang to you, not at you, like so many pop singers today. Even singers of standards.

Broken bottles, broken plates, broken switches, broken gates. Broken dishes, broken parts, streets are filled with broken hearts.

Some are masters of illusions, some are ministers of trade, all under the same delusion, all their beds unmade.

My senses have been stripped, my hands can't feel to grip, my toes to numb to step, wait only for my boot heels to be wandering.

I'm a good friend of Jonah Lehrer's. You should go on a date with him.