I seen her with the milkman, riding down the street. When you're through with my baby, milkman, send her home to me.

The best of my songs are more than just a joke. There's something else going on - a character, or it's not just a plain joke.

My music has a high irritation factor. I`ve always tried to say something. Eccentric lyrics about eccentric people. Often it was is joke. But I would plead guilty on the grounds that I prefer eccetricity to the bland.

I'm interested in geography and weather and things like that, and if you don't write love songs, you've gotta go somewhere. I wrote a lot about places because that's what else there was. I had to stop myself from writing more of them.

I've written about a lot of different things, but the whole idea of writing for another character is unusual for pop music... Most of the repertory is love songs, and most of mine isn't. I don't know if that's a mental defect, or shyness, or what.

Who would want to break into [the music business]? It's like a bank that's already been robbed.

There's a million white people better qualified than a black man to be president of America.