Knowledge is freedom and ignorance is slavery

Jazz musicians are so comfortable. The reason they can't do what we do is because they're so comfortable doin' what they do.

You can't play anything on a horn that Louis Armstrong hasn't played

My father's rich, my momma's good looking. Right? And I can play the Blues. I've never suffered and don't intend to suffer.

I used to enjoy all the white bands when I was a kid listening to the radio. But the record companies, they take music and label it - like, they say "rock". Because the white singers can't sound like James Brown, they call him "soul". They've been doing that for years. That's the prejudice crap.

Monk was a gentle person, gentle and beautiful, but he was strong as an ox. And if I had ever said something about punching Monk out in front of his face - and I never did - then somebody should have just come and got me and taken me to the madhouse, because Monk could have just picked my little ass up and thrown me through a wall.

John Lee Hooker is the funkiest man alive