I told somebody in Europe I was 43. I never tell my true age. It's ridiculous that people ask. The press doesn't deserve anything but lies.

The first time I met Patti Smith was in a laundromat. We knew some of the same people, including Richard Hell.

Style to me is incidental. The British are very adept at creating it for its own sake, but the best style is incidental. John Coltrane had a style but it was totally incidental to what he was.

The Beat thing happened when I was younger. I used to run away from home, inspired by the Beats, like in '64 and '65.

In Old English they don't say I had a dream, but there's another usage of the word - "life is but a dream," to be corny about it. It's implied with eyes wide open, rather than asleep. But I'm not a philosopher to explain myself. I wish I could. Maybe that's why I'm a musician.

When I think of 'influence', I think of 'influenza', like somebody's picked up a germ.

I wonder what all those Chinese poets sound like in Chinese. I like their distilled quality.