Those wounds stay with you, and you turn them into a language and a purpose.

Yeah, I had gay friends. The first thing I realized was that everybody's different, and it becomes obvious that all of the gay stereotypes are ridiculous.

You've got to be able to hold a lot of contradictory ideas in your mind without going nuts. I feel like to do my job right, when I walk out on stage I've got to feel like it's the most important thing in the world. Also I've got to feel like, well, it's only rock and roll. Somehow you've got to believe both of those things.

There's a beauty in work and I love it, all different kinds of work. That's what I consider it. Rock is my job, and that's my work. And I work my ass off, you know.

Politics and life go hand in hand.

The different social forces that affected my parents' lives or my friends' lives or I saw around me became essential for me to write about.

You can hide beneath the covers and study your pain, make crosses from your lovers, throw roses in the rain. Waste your summer praying in vain, for a savior to rise from these streets.