The old ways still apply. You can still send tapes to record companies, and there are record companies, you know, there are one or two of the record companies do declare proudly that they listen to every single one that comes.

The music tends to be an expression of one's darker moments.

Obviously record companies tend to be following what the scene is rather than making the scene.

I don't know what you wanna describe as Rock 'n' Roll, but I certainly thought that 60s stuff, Bob Dylan and the Beatles, changed the world a little bit. But the effect seems to have retreated. I think it's harder than we think to change the world. These things go in cycles. It doesn't seem to have done an awful lot of good, does it? You know, all the talk of racial harmony and equality in the world... we haven't got a long way since the 60s.

I think a lot of things do influence me, but the influence mechanism is as such that these things dive into your brain and bury themselves into your subconscious and you're never quite sure where and how they're going to emerge. I don't think I really take direct influence.

The only way artists can do things is to do it for themselves. Trying to second guess what the public wants or likes is kind of a fool's game.

It's crazy that America gives such a paltry percentage of its GNP to the starving nations.