I wondered how I was going to do it and keep my job at Rolling Stone at the same time. They were very nice, and they let me disappear for two days a week for a couple of hours. That's how long shooting was.

I think in its own small way, it did push people to be more accepting of different kinds of music. It definitely made music more egalitarian in terms of, it took away the shame of the goofy bands that you liked.

What really takes me back is when I'm walking around the Lower East Side, because we went to so many places [there] - the bakery, a mannequin store, all these factories with mice running around. That also is very visceral and takes me back. Pool halls, tattoo parlors, all kinds of stuff like that.

We had a wonderful department that scouted out new music. It was beneficial to Rolling Stone, because I would come back and say, "You have to hear this, you have to hear that," and I found a lot of bands to feature, emerging bands. It [ended up being] symbiotic.

I can barely listen to my tapes when I'm transcribing, because I can't stand how I sound.

[On a high school visit by Destiny's Child:] Then they appeared, golden Glamazons resplendent in hot pants the size of a dryer sheet and gold stiletto boots. The kids in the front row, clearly on funkiness overload, had the walleyed look of the Today's Catch section of the supermarket.

I grew up in New Jersey in the '80s. That means one thing: Big hair. ... I had big hair, my boyfriends had big hair, we all had big hair. Our prom looked like the poodle division of the Westminster dog show.