All I cared about was the music, like hearing Townes [ Van Zandt] talking about "For the sake of the song"; it's all that mattered. In spite of me a couple of things happened, mainly the Eagles and Seven Bridges Road. That certainly helped me survive. Joan Baez, Rita Coolidge, and Ian Matthews did it.

I was born and grew up in the Deep South, and I must say it wasn't easy for me. I always marched to a drummer, I had different views about politics and religion and I had them relatively young.

I didn't have the self-promotion instinct, and I just didn't care about it. I sort of had a "beat" attitude.

The song [The White Trash Song] was not a put down of [ my country cousins ], but a celebration. I wrote that early on, as a teenager.

I had admired Waylon [ Jennings], but I never expected to meet him and get to know him. When I finally moved to Nashville years later, one night I went to a Harlan Howard Guitar Pull thing, and there was Waylon. He started talking about how much he loved my work and how great I was, and I couldn't even get a word in.

My playing style is very eccentric and mostly self taught.

I grew up wanting a guitar, my family was very poor. When I was fourteen my mother bought me a Gibson ES 125 thin body. That was a bunch of money in those days - $125.00.