There's the wind And the rain And the mercy of the fallen Who say, "Hey, it's not my place To know what's right" There's the weak And the strong And the many stars that guide us We have some of them inside us

What happened on "As Cool As I Am" was, you know how in the `90s, "the personal is political, the political is personal"? That was a really big thing. Choices you made about how you recorded and what instruments you used and how much real versus how much synthetic. Those were choices that were seen as very political at the time.

What was nice about the nineties is that it was an example of music that responded to a desire of the times. It spoke to the social conditions of the times. Women were making more money. Women were saying, "My voice counts. If we're going out on a Friday night, I don't want to see a Rambo movie. I want to go see a singer/songwriter who sings about my life".

I have odometer readings, kids; all sorts of measurements of what I've been doing for the last 20 years. I get it. I get that it was a while ago.

The best, most solid place to stand as you look at our present situation is on a foundation of history. The Roman Empire, the British Empire, and the Nazi empire all have things in common.

They preach that I should save the world. They pray that I won't do a better job of it.

[Mortal City ] was also the beginning of the reality of the fact that I was going to have little pieces of my personality identifying with all of these different parts of the country.