Black people lived right by the railroad tracks and the train would shake their houses at night. I would hear it as a boy and I thought: I'm gonna make a song that sounds like that.

But I was singing loud, and most singers weren't singing loud.

Gay people are the sweetest, kindest, most artistic, warmest and most thoughtful people in the world. And since the beginning of time all they've ever been is kicked.

I'm a conductor of revivals. The only minister in the whole package. Little Richard, the evangelist.

That's what Tina Turner did, too - sang blues up-tempo - and they called it rock 'n' roll.

To me, true rock 'n' roll has a lot of bottom in it.

If at first you don't succeed, you get back up and you try ... and you try ... and you try it again ... except ice skating, I hate this crap, I quit!