Beautiful tunes are all very good and fine, and great musicians are always great, but that alone isn't enough.

If you can't get yourself understood, you may have trouble, so you need some interpretation every now and again wherever you might be.

Los Angeles is not Mexico City, but we have many fine nightclubs and restaurants here. It is enough. One must not aim too high.

In oddball places, the electric guitar has been taken as an almost alien object - this weird, six-stringed instrument that fell down to earth and was then played loud but with traditional grace and intelligence

The environment is rarely put on tape, or if it is, it's so abstract that most people never realize it. They just don't know what it means. But if you can show it to them, then that's what becomes the main instrument.

You have to be around people you trust; otherwise you can't do anything - you're afraid, you're paranoid, and you can't do any work.

Once you feel that you've learned some skills and you know how to make records, the next thing is, "Do we ever get to make one that people will really like?" Because then we'll have something to do.