Pessimism and optimism are slammed up against each other in my records, the tension between them is where it's all at, it's what lights the fire.

Every fool has a reason for feeling sorry for himself.

Small unit democracy, I found early on, didn't work for me.

I didn't have a blueprint from my childhood that I could call on, which is an enormous deficit when you're trying to put together a family life. I didn't see a family life where men were thriving inside of it. You know, my dad tended to blame the family for his inability to achieve what he wanted to achieve, you know? So, unfortunately, I was coming from that particular frame of mind.

That Elvis, man, he is all there is. There ain't no more. Everything starts and ends with him. He wrote the book. But for him, I'd be selling encyclopedias right now. There have been a lotta tough guys. There have been pretenders. And there have been contenders. But there is only one king.

I like narrative storytelling as being part of a tradition, a folk tradition.

Well I got this guitar and I learned how to make it talk.