Practice? I never practice. I just write songs and take solos.

Boogie! I hate boogie, God, I mean, not the Chicago boogie like Willie Dixon or Howlin' Wolf, but all those awful white bands.

I don't think anybody thinks about their past much, unless they're in a mental institution.

Emily Dickinson has great sound and sense.

All the Frank O'Hara types seem to have very little sound stuff going... it's so chatty or something.

I write a lot of more instrumental music than I do vocal music. It's because I come out of a background of playing piano and then playing sax for a number of years. I kind of got into rock backwards. A lot of guys go into rock and then get sick of it and then go into something else. I came the other way, so I've always just had a lot more stuff lying around.

I'm kind of proud of that little record! I mean I've heard about a million other records that have come out since then by all these groups around here and there and I really like 'Little Johnny Jewel'.