T-Bone Burnett once said that much of rock music is simply someone going wahhh daddy.

In the third grade, a nun stuffed me in a garbage can under her desk because she said that's where I belonged. I also had the distinction of being the only altar boy knocked down by a priest during mass.

Physical pain is my friend. I pursue it every night for four hours.

In the early years, I found a voice that was my voice and also partly my father's voice. But isn't that what you always do? Why do kids at 5 years old go into the closet and put their daddy's shoes on? Hey, my kids do it.

I always write with an audience in mind. If I feel that [connection] coming back at me then I feel like I'm doing my job. That's why people come to my music - for some emotional experience or a perspective, either on their own lives, or on the world that they're living in.

You're born into this life paying for the sins of somebody else's past.

You can't shut off the risk and the pain without losing the love that remains.