I don't feel I have to top myself at all.

You know what you can gain when you sit down with the Moroccans. As a person and as a musician. That's how you grow.

I played guitar all my life, all the way through the Yardbirds, but I knew that for me this was going to be a guitar vehicle, because that's what I wanted it to be.

There is far more sensitivity in acoustic guitar players than could ever be compared to any synthesizer. That's a personal point of view but that's the way I see it. I think that's what it's all about. The drive, the fire, the passion - it all comes out on the guitar.

Seeing people's faces, really getting off on them, makes me incredibly happy. Genuinely.

My vocation is more in composition really than anything else - building up harmonies using the guitar, orchestrating the guitar like an army, a guitar army.

There was no working title for the album. The record-jacket designer said `When I think of the group, I always think of power and force. There's a definite presence there.' That was it. He wanted to call it `Obelisk'. To me, it was more important what was behind the obelisk. The cover is very tongue-in-cheek, to be quite honest. Sort of a joke on 2001. I think it's quite amusing.