Writin songs is like a mystery. The most difficult thing to do is have a good idea. If you have a decent idea, the songs are the easy part. Actually having something to say is the hard part. If you get an idea for a song, then it pulls you along. There are just some ideas that you get that are really hard to edit out; it's hard to stop thinking about some bad ideas. So you just finish it and you end up putting it on a record.

She was ugly from the front, and I said ugly, ugly, ugly, ugly, ugly. Well, I could handle it behind her.

Somehow you can tell the difference when a song is written just to get on the radio and when what someone does is their whole life. That comes through in Bob Dylan, Paul Simon, Willie Nelson. There is no separating their life from their music.

That's right, you're not from Texas. But Texas wants you anyways.

Every afternoon, I was in the pasture with cattle or fishing and shooting my BB gun. That kind of freedom allows imagination to develop.

Horses teach you patience and how to do things the right way so you can get the right result.

The loss of Jerry Garcia feels like the end of an era in the same way it felt when Elvis died and John Lennon was killed.