More of my songs are intended to be funny than almost anyone else. Sometimes maybe it cheers me up a bit. I've got a distance from it. Sometimes what I'm writing is more important to me than the rest of my life. It's more important to me that I'm writing well than anything else.

He got drunk last night, kicked Mama down the stairs. But I'm alright, so I don't care.

I think in most cases, unless you're writing about a character who is garrulous, you say what you've got to say and then get out. Those little conjunctions, those little turnaround words help you do it. That's the way I like to write: I get rid of things rather than add them.

I've written a song for Prince. I never showed it to Prince, but just to see if I could do it. At the time, when I sort of knew him, he was recording a song a day. I wondered if I could do that. So I wrote it.

God bless the potholes on Memory Lane.

I like the performing. And interviews, even. And the stuff that's not sitting in a room by yourself with empty paper. But I never loved writing, to tell you the truth.

I like to write my lyrics on clay tablets.