Over the past 40 years, the tradition of Southern progressivism has been somewhat successfully erased by right-wing revisionist historians.

As important as politics are to me, the life and the spirit of people's emotions are much more important. People live real lives where they love and grieve and feel pain and joy and that is a whole separate sphere. All that political stuff, I believe in it strongly, but not as strongly as I believe that at some point you or someone is going to need a song to sit with and comfort them in a hard time.

Giving up and doing something else (nursing, for me) was exactly what eventually led me to making music that other people wanted to hear.

There's this idea that there was a point in our childhood when we were in some way better than we are now and we should try to hang on to that.

I always want to try and see what the appeal is in anything. It's the healthiest and most honest approach.

Every place on earth has a frequency. It's not good or bad, it's just the way it is, and if you can attune yourself to that frequency, then you can find comfort in that.

There is something fierce and starved about first ideas.