I'm not inspired by songwriting at all; that took place years ago. I'm pretty well established, as far as my influences go. I don't listen to music anymore. It all sounds the same to me.

You always want to write the perfect song. But no one will ever write the perfect song, I guess. I would just like to write on that has all the elements of what I'm tring to do. And I'm working on it. I'm always working on it.

I'm improvising all the time. Everything I do is improvised. On the piano, at least.

And Lennie Tristano I like a lot, I still like him.

I'm always storing away phrases and ideas and things that I think might turn into songs.

It was the British rockers that saved me. They brought me to a different generation altogether [in the 60th]. The Who and The Yardbirds and Georgie Fame and Van Morrison and all those people. The only person who ever did my songs in [ U.S] country was Bonnie Raitt.

There's a few tunes of mine that don't have jokes, but most of them have a joke and they have a humorous point of view somewhere.