I was really kind of shy as a child. But I would do things for attention.

People called rock & roll 'African music.' They called it 'voodoo music.' They said that it would drive the kids insane. They said that it was just a flash in the pan - the same thing that they always used to say about hip-hop.

I invented rock & roll. Jimi Hendrix was my guitar player. James Brown was my vocalist.

I look back on my life, comin' out of Macon, Georgia - I never thought I'd be a superstar, a living legend. I never heard of no rock and roll in my life.

I think they saw me as something like a deliverer, a way out. My means of expression, my music, was a way in which a lot of people wished they could express themselves and couldn't.

And I'd like to give my love to everybody, and let them know that the grass may look greener on the other side, but believe me, it's just as hard to cut.

A-bop-bop-a-loom-op-a-lop-bop-boom.