Radio is aimed at the 30-year-old market, so you have to have great music and appeal to get that age group. And you need a record company to believe in you. It's like a bit of the perfect storm.

You know, I've always said, I've never felt I was a particularly good singer, but I've always thought I had a great knack for picking hit songs.

He said, Son, I've made a life out of readin' people's faces, and knowin' what their cards were by the way they held their eyes.

Well, I don't think everything necessarily that I touch turns to gold, but I think I get great joy out of it regardless of whether it is successful or not.

I do ballads that say what every man wants to say and that every woman wants to hear, or I do songs about social issues.

You picked a fine time to leave me Lucille, with four hungry children and a crop in the field.

If someone asks you to run the 100 yard dash as fast as you can, you'll run the 100 dash as fast as you think you can. But if you put someone along side you who runs a little faster, you are going to run faster - whoa - I better step it up a little bit. I do things even I didn't know I was capable of.