I don’t care about the rules. In fact, if I don’t break the rules at least ten times in every song, then I’m not doing my job properly. Emotion is much more important than making mistakes, so be prepared to look like a chump. If you become too guarded and too processed, the music loses its spontaneity and gut feeling

If you don't have an album or you don't have any tune, you can't start.

There was mass hysteria in the Chess Recording Studio when I did the "Shapes of Things" solo ... they weren't expecting it, and it was just some weird mist coming from the East out of an amp.

I wanted to be in Rolling Stone number two with a tomorrow feel to it, like an experimental Rolling Stones with Jagger singing.

The Strat covers the complete spectrum of human emotion .. the tremolo enables you to do anything - you can hit any note known to mankind

At the end of the day, there are a hell of a lot of notes being played out there and I defy the average middle-American or the average punter to differentiate between them.

I do hear snippets on the radio. I do hear a little bit of me, sometimes great chunks of me. But I have to take that as a compliment; there's no way you can get sour grapes about that. But if somebody starts taking your whole new thing lock, stock, and barrel, and do their own version of it before you do it, that's not on.