I have a face I cannot show, I make the rules up as I go.

I have been around for a long, long time. I didn't make it 'til I was older. I went through the period when women were not getting signed, particularly if you were writing songs that were lyrically propelled.

I'm singing the way that I love to sing, which is like old soul, like old Al Green. I grew up about an hour from Memphis. So all that music that I grew up with - the Stax music and early rhythm n' blues - I'm doing that. I'm actually getting out from behind my guitar and I'm singing.

I feel we are so blessed to live in a country where we enjoy so many rights that other countries cannot even begin to imagine. However, it terrifies me that we seem to have lost touch with our connection to the earth. I am concerned that we have risen to such heights of arrogance in our refusal to acknowledge that our earth is rapidly changing in ways that might affect us catastrophically but instead, we hold steadfast to our belief that nothing can happen to us as a people.

Artists have really never had any representation on Capitol Hill, because it's not the nature of the artist to join together and make a unified presence. Those days kind of died in the '60s.

If compassion was the motivating factor behind all of our decisions, would our world not be a completely different place?

Then when I cut my hair short, my career tanked for about four years!