and when they pulled her from the wreck, you know, she still had on her shades

Writing songs is like capturing birds without killing them. Sometimes you end up with nothing but a mouthful of feathers.

Oh, I'm not a percussionist, I just like to hit things.

Most of us have the residue of thousands of songs in our ears, that if you end up songwriting, I think you're mostly smoking the residue of all that material you absorbed over time.

I think all songs should have weather in them. Names of towns and streets, and they should have a couple of sailors. I think those are just song prerequisites.

Songs really are like a form of time travel because they really have moved forward in a bubble. Everyone who's connected with it, the studio's gone, the musicians are gone, and the only thing that's left is this recording which was only about a three-minute period maybe 70 years ago.

I know a girl, she been married so many times, she got rice marks all over her face