For me, music is in no way ornamental or decorative, it's constitutive of who I am. And that's why, when I say I'm a blues man, that's a very serious vocation - to muster the courage to find your own unique voice, to forge your distinctive style in the world, to leave your imprint in the sands of time in such a way that your singularity, your individuality, remains something that people have to come to terms with.

It's fashionable to be indifferent to other people's suffering

I wished the president [Barack Obama] were more "Martin Luther King-like."

The blues aren’t pessimistic. We’re prisoners of hope but we tell the truth and the truth is dark.

We are intent on building a movement. The next step is grassroots town meetings. We must keep alive the dialogue around the covenants.

As human beings, everyone has stuff coming at them, and a certain kind of fear.

liberty, which means resisting all forms of cultural authoritarianism, be it from the right wing church, black ideologues, black nationalists, or mainstream white media. We have to accent liberty and freedom of expression and thought in all their forms.