Another lesson about a naive fool who came to Babylon, and found out that the pie don't taste so sweet.

Those songs [from church], I think, shaped to some degree how I would evolve as a writer, pentameter of songs, the melodies of those kind of hillbilly hymns - I used to refer to them - because they were not Southern gospel as much as they were passed down from Scottish Welsh Protestant hymnals.

They both sang. My grandmother had a very haunted mountain voice and would sing hymns. My grandpa would sing but in a very, very subdued way.

In the past 3-4 years I've developed a habit of keeping numerous small cassette recorders in my house and in a bag with me so that I'm able to commit to tape memory song ideas on a constant basis.

I'll never quit playing country music, or at least acknowledging it, always, as the cornerstone of what I am.

[My grandfather -a miner] had black lung, and he didn't talk about it much. It's almost like a combat veteran. But he witnessed some horrific things.

I quit eating red meat a long time ago. I'm a vegetarian, but not by a moral issue or any kind of stand. I still eat dairy. And I quit eating sugar about the same time I quit eating red meat, but I eat fruit.