I have always identified with Joan Didion's depiction of Los Angeles and Southern California, ever since reading 'Play It As It Lays,' 'Slouching Towards Bethlehem' and 'The White Album.'

Whenever any great song or album gets lost in the ether, someone is deprived of the joy of hearing it, and the great effort of those who created and recorded the work is damaged.

I have always thought that change you can see and feel is best.

I'm not trying to amass people in the streets. I just want them to be more aware.

I slept in Uday Hussein's bed - that was just so strange. Went to Saddam's palace, was in a mortar attack - crazy stuff. And like three days later you're back in traffic on Sunset Boulevard. It's all kind of behind you, which is kind of perfect for a guy like me because I can take that and turn it into quite the tale.

I think, to a great degree, we humans still divide ourselves into two species, even though we are monotypic. There are males and females. We see them as different and not equal.

I think that humans have a huge capacity to carry pain and sadness. There are things that haunt us our entire lives; we are unable to let them go. The good times seem almost effervescent and dreamlike in comparison with the times that didn't go so well.