We started shooting, and then Jodie found out she was pregnant. Forest broke it to me - he'd gone to work and heard it on the radio! It seemed like the movie was doomed. But, like these characters, there was a disregard for all the signs along the way.

I listen to hundreds of those hymns sung repeatedly over the years of my life. And I know that they probably influenced a rhyme scheme maybe to certain extent. They influenced the pentameter of placement of words, etc. And it's not something that's a conscious thing that occurred.

To me, the hook of the riff is what makes a great guitar recording. It's the backbone of the whole song. When you have a strong riff, it's the rocket fuel for the track.

I heard more of the stories from my mother and my granny and my aunts that would describe what they had known that he didn't often talk about. I remember seeing [grandfather] as a child. He was working in a mine that was fairly close to their home there in Betsy Lane, Ky., and it was so close in proximity that he wouldn't clean up or shower there. He would just drive back home. And I remember one time seeing him come in and it was like seeing an alien person show up because he was still covered in coal dust and soot, and it had a profound impact on me.

Country music originates with the colloquial, rural aspects of white America. It's really, truly, rural white America's blues.

Film acting has been a very pure experience, because you have to give the purest form of yourself as an artist.

No compression or as little as possible - that's how you get a good recording.