One summer I remember, I got exposed to Chuck Berry and Buddy Holly and Buddy Holly was a very very big, made a very big impression on me. Because of a lot of things, you know, the way he looked and his charisma.

I tried when I was 13, when my grandparents gave me an acoustic guitar, and I tried for a year. It hurt so much to play. I mean, the fingertips hurt so much, I gave up.

I have no problem with religion, and I grew up with a strong curiosity about spiritual matters, but my searching took me away from church and community worship to the internal journey. Before my recovery began, I found my God in music and the arts, with writers like Hermann Hesse, and musicians like Muddy Waters, Howlin' Wolf, and Little Walter.

Musically, he was like an old man in a boy's skin.

I never set myself too high a goal. It was always tone and feeling, for me.

For me there is something primitively soothing about this music, and it went straight to my nervous system, making me feel ten feet tall.

My driving philosophy about making music is that you can reduce it all down to one note if that note is played with the right kind of sincerity.