I always had a great appreciation for jazz, but I'm a very pedestrian musician. I get by. I like to think that my main instrument is vocabulary.

You almost have to create situations in order to write about them, so I live in a constant state of self-imposed poverty. I don't want to live any other way.

I knelt at the altar of Ray Charles for years. I worked at a restaurant, and that's all there was on the jukebox.

I always thought songs are movies for the ears and films are like songs for the eyes.

The folks who know the truth aren't talking.... The ones who don't have a clue, you can't shut them up!

Leona Helmsley's dog made $12 million last year... and Dean McLaine, a farmer in Ohio, made $30,000. It's just a gigantic version of the madness that grows in every one of our brains.

I like writing melody without an instrument. It's just so - it's more like the choreography of a bee; you just go.