You better not compromise yourself, it's all you've got.

When you hold somebody, you gotta hold them like it's the last minute of your life.

I'm just doing what I wanted to and what feels right and not settling for bullshit and it worked. How can they be mad at that?

Audiences like their blues singers to be miserable.

After they see me, when their mothers are feeding them all that cashmere sweater and girdle ----- [expletive deleted by the New York Times], maybe they'll have a second thought - that they can be themselves and win.

I would trade all my tomorrow's for one single yesterday.

You're only as much as you settle for. If they settle for being somebody's dishwasher that's their own f***ing problem. If you don't settle for that and you keep fighting it, you know, you'll end up anything you want to be.