Multi-instrumentalists

"Anything I can sing, I call a song. Anything I can't sing, I call a poem."

"Because Dickens and Dostoyevsky and Woody Guthrie were telling their stories much better than I ever could, I decided to stick to my own mind."

"There's no black and white, left and right to me anymore; there's only up and down and down is very close to the ground. And I'm trying to go up without thinking about anything trivial such as politics. They has got nothing to do with it. I'm thinking about the general people and when they get hurt."

"I am a writer an a singer of the words I write I am no speaker nor any politician an my songs speak for me because I write them in the confinement of my own mind an have t cope with no one except my own self."

"do Not create anything, it will be misinterpreted. it will not change. it will follow you the rest of your life."

"a poem is a naked person . . . some people say that I am a poet"

"He's a pinboy. He also wears suspenders. He's a real person. You know him, but not by that name... I saw him come into the room one night and he looked like a camel. He proceeded to put his eyes in his pocket. I asked this guy who he was and he said, "That's Mr. Jones." Then I asked this cat, "Doesn't he do anything but put his eyes in his pocket?" And he told me, "He puts his nose on the ground." It's all there, it's a true story."

"You don't necessarily have to write to be a poet. Some people work in gas stations and they're poets. I don't call myself a poet because I don't like the word. I'm a trapeze artist."

"I find it easy to write songs. I been writing songs for a long time and the words to the songs aren't written out just for the paper; they're written as you can read it, you dig. If you take whatever there is to the song away—the beat, the melody—I could still recite it. I see nothing wrong with songs you can't do that with either—songs that, if you took the beat and the melody away, they wouldn't stand up because they're not supposed to do that, you know. Songs are songs."

"I accept chaos. I am not sure whether it accepts me. I know there are some people terrified of the bomb, but there are others terrified to be seen carrying a Modern Screen magazine. Experience teaches that silence terrifies the most."

"Reporter: How many people who labor in the same musical vineyard in which you toil - how many are protest singers? That is, people who use their music, and use the songs to protest the, uh, social state in which we live today: the matter of war, the matter of crime, or whatever it might be. Bob Dylan: Um...how many? Reporter: Yes. How many? Bob Dylan: Uh, I think there's about, uh...136. Reporter: You say about 136, or you mean exactly 136? Bob Dylan: Uh, it's either 136 or 142."

"Bob Dylan: I do know what my songs are about. Playboy: And what's that? Bob Dylan: Oh, some are about four minutes; some are about five, and some, believe it or not, are about eleven or twelve."

"Colleges are like old-age homes; except for the fact that more people die in colleges."

"I don't believe you! You're a liar! ... Play it fucking loud!"

"Keep a good head and always carry a light bulb."

"God, I'm glad I'm not me."

"You have to be let alone to really accomplish anything."

"I used to think that myself and my songs were the same thing. But I don't believe that any more. There's myself and there's my song, which I hope is everybody's song."

"My songs always sound a lot better in person than they do on the record."

"Greed and lust I can understand, but I can't understand the values of definition and confinement. Definition destroys. Besides, there's nothing definite in this world."

"Ron Rosenbaum: Why are you doing what you're doing? Bob Dylan: [Pause] Because I don't know anything else to do. I'm good at it. Ron Rosenbaum: How would you describe "it"? Bob Dylan: I'm an artist. I try to create art."

"I consider myself a poet first and a musician second. I live like a poet and I'll die like a poet."

"Art is the perpetual motion of illusion. The highest purpose of art is to inspire. What else can you do? What else can you do for anyone but inspire them?"

"I kinda live where I find myself."

"I think women rule the world, and that no man has ever done anything that a woman either hasn't allowed him to do or encouraged him to do."

"I wanted just a song to sing, and there came a certain point where I couldn't sing anything. So I had to write what I wanted to sing 'cos nobody else was writing what I wanted to sing."

"At certain times I read a lot of poetry. My favorite poets are Shelley and Keats. Rimbaud is so identifiable. Lord Byron. I don't know. Lately if I read poems, it's like I can always hear the guitar. Even with Shakespeare's sonnets I can hear a melody because it's all broken up into timed phrases so I hear it. I always keep thinking, 'What kind of song would this be?'"

"Chaos is a friend of mine."

"I think of a hero as someone who understands the degree of responsibility that comes with his freedom."

"If the songs are dreamed, it's like my voice is coming out of their dream."

"I think a poet is anybody who wouldn't call himself a poet. Anybody who could possibly call himself a poet just cannot be a poet."

"When I first heard Elvis's voice I just knew that I wasn't going to work for anybody and nobody was going to be my boss. He is the deity supreme of rock and roll religion as it exists in today's form. Hearing him for the first time was like busting out of jail. I think for a long time that freedom to me was Elvis singing 'Blue Moon of Kentucky.' I thank God for Elvis."

"The first two lines, which rhymed 'kiddin' you' and 'didn't you,' just about knocked me out, and later on, when I got to the jugglers and the chrome horse and the princess on the steeple, it all just about got to be too much."

"It's not to anybody's best interest to think about how they will be perceived tomorrow. It hurts you in the long run."

"My sense of rhyme used to be more involved in my songwriting than it is... Still staying in the unconscious frame of mind, you can pull yourself out and throw up two rhymes first and work it back. You get the rhymes first and work it back and then see if you can make it make sense in another kind of way. You can still stay in the unconscious frame of mind to pull it off, which is the state of mind you have to be in anyway."

"People today are still living off the table scraps of the sixties. They are still being passed around — the music and the ideas."

"That ear - I mean, Jesus, he's got to will that to the Smithsonian."

"Here's the thing with me and the religious thing. This is the flat-out truth: I find the religiosity and philosophy in the music. I don't find it anywhere else."

"I change during the course of a day. I wake and I'm one person, and when I go to sleep I know for certain I'm somebody else. I don't know who I am most of the time. It doesn't even matter to me."

"I'm inconsistent, even to myself."

"Bob Dylan: The media is all-pervasive. What can a writer think of to write that you don't see every day in a newspaper or on television? Interviewer: ...Do you think that TV and the media have killed poetry and literature? Bob Dylan: Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. ... What's a writer to do if every idea is exposed in the media before he can get to it or let it evolve? What's a writer gonna write about? ... We're living in a science-fiction world. We're living in a world that Disney has conquered. Disney's science fiction. Theme parks, trendy streets, it's all science fiction. So I would say, if a writer has got something to say, he'll have to do it in that– Interviewer: Outside of the real world? Bob Dylan: There is a real world. Science fiction has become the real world. Whether we realize it or not, it has."

"We may not be able to defeat these swine, but we don't have to join them."

"I had ambitions to set out and find, like an odyssey or going home somewhere... set out to find... this home that I'd left a while back and couldn't remember exactly where it was, but I was on my way there. And encountering what I encountered on the way was how I envisioned it all. I didn't really have any ambition at all. I was born very far from where I'm supposed to be, and so, I'm on my way home, you know?"

"I didn't go to classes. I just didn't feel like it."

"An artist has gotta be careful never really to arrive at a place where he thinks he's at somewhere. You always have to realize that you're constantly in a state of becoming."

"You don't need my autograph. If you needed it, I'd give it to you."

"You can't be wise and in love at the same time."

"I had no answers to any of those questions any more than any other performer did, really. But, you know, that didn't stop the press or people or whoever they were from asking these questions. They, for some reason the press thought that performers had the answers to all these problems in the society and you know, like what can... What can you say to something like that? I mean, it's just kind of absurd."

"I read On the Road in maybe 1959. It changed my life like it changed everyone else's."

"Someone handed me Mexico City Blues in St. Paul [Minnesota] in 1959 and it blew my mind. It was the first poetry that spoke my own language."

"I think it's the land. The streams, the forests, the vast emptiness. The land created me. I'm wild and lonesome. Even as I travel the cities, I'm more at home in the vacant lots. But I have a love for humankind, a love of truth, and a love of justice. I think I have a dualistic nature. I'm more of an adventurous type than a relationship type."

"It's not a character like in a book or a movie. He's not a bus driver. He doesn't drive a forklift. He's not a serial killer. It's me who's singing that, plain and simple. We shouldn't confuse singers and performers with actors. Actors will say, “My character this, and my character that.” Like beating a dead horse. Who cares about the character? Just get up and act. You don't have to explain it to me."

"It's peculiar and unnerving in a way to see so many young people walking around with cellphones and iPods in their ears and so wrapped up in media and video games. It robs them of their self-identity. It's a shame to see them so tuned out to real life. Of course they are free to do that, as if that's got anything to do with freedom. The cost of liberty is high, and young people should understand that before they start spending their life with all those gadgets."

"The people in my songs are all me."

"A man is successful if he gets up in the morning and goes to bed at night, and in between does what he likes."

"It wasn't money or love that I was looking for. I had a heightened sense of awareness, was set in my ways, impractical and a visionary to boot. My mind was strong like a trap and I didn't need any guarantee of validity."

"I was heading for the fantastic lights. No doubt about it. Could it be that I was being deceived? Not likely. I don't think I had enough imagination to be deceived; had no false hope, either. I'd come from a long ways off and had started from a long ways down. But now destiny was about to manifest itself. I felt like it was looking right at me and nobody else."

"Morality has nothing in common with politics."

"What was the future? The future was a solid wall, not promising, not threatening—all bunk. No guarantees of anything, not even the guarantee that life isn't one big joke."

"Opportunities may come along for you to convert something—something that exists into something that didn't yet."

"America was changing. I had a feeling of destiny and I was riding the changes... My consciousness was beginning to change, too, change and stretch."

"I had been in a motorcycle accident and I'd been hurt, but I recovered. Truth was that I wanted to get out of the rat race. Having children changed my life and segregated me from just about everybody and everything that was going on. Outside of my family, nothing held any real interest for me and I was seeing everything through different glasses."

"I had very little in common with and knew even less about a generation that I was supposed to be the voice of."

"I'm a '60s troubadour, a folk-rock relic, a wordsmith from bygone days, a fictitious head of state from a place nobody knows. I'm in the bottomless pit of cultural oblivion."

"Sometimes you say things in songs even if there's a small chance of them being true. And sometimes you say things that have nothing to do with the truth of what you want to say and sometimes you say things that everyone knows to be true. Then again, at the same time, you're thinking that the only truth on earth is that there is no truth on it. Whatever you are saying, you're saying in a ricky-tick way. There's never time to reflect. You stitched and pressed and packed and drove, is what you did."

"I put one on the turntable and when the needle dropped, I was stunned — didn't know if I was stoned or straight... All these songs together, one after another made my head spin. It made me want to gasp. It was like the land parted."

"[Ref Rimbaud line 'Je est un autre,]' “which translates into ‘I is someone else.’ When I read those words the bells went off. It made perfect sense. I wished someone would have mentioned that to me earlier.”"

"The road out would be treacherous, and I didn’t know where it would lead but I followed it anyway. It was a strange world ahead that would unfold, a thunderhead of a world with jagged lightning edges. Many got it wrong and never did get it right. I went straight into it. It was wide open. One thing for sure, not only was it not run by God, but it wasn’t run by the devil either."

"If someone had ever told me that I had the slightest chance of winning the Nobel Prize, I would have to think that I'd have about the same odds as standing on the moon."

"I began to think about William Shakespeare, the great literary figure. I would reckon he thought of himself as a dramatist. The thought that he was writing literature couldn't have entered his head. His words were written for the stage. Meant to be spoken not read. When he was writing Hamlet, I'm sure he was thinking about a lot of different things: "Who're the right actors for these roles?" "How should this be staged?" "Do I really want to set this in Denmark?" His creative vision and ambitions were no doubt at the forefront of his mind, but there were also more mundane matters to consider and deal with. "Is the financing in place?" "Are there enough good seats for my patrons?" "Where am I going to get a human skull?" I would bet that the farthest thing from Shakespeare's mind was the question "Is this literature?""

"As a performer I've played for 50,000 people and I've played for 50 people and I can tell you that it is harder to play for 50 people. 50,000 people have a singular persona, not so with 50. Each person has an individual, separate identity, a world unto themselves. They can perceive things more clearly. Your honesty and how it relates to the depth of your talent is tried."

"Like Shakespeare, I too am often occupied with the pursuit of my creative endeavors and dealing with all aspects of life's mundane matters. "Who are the best musicians for these songs?" "Am I recording in the right studio?" "Is this song in the right key?" Some things never change, even in 400 years. Not once have I ever had the time to ask myself, "Are my songs literature?" So, I do thank the Swedish Academy, both for taking the time to consider that very question, and, ultimately, for providing such a wonderful answer."

"You sound like a hillbilly; We want folk singers here."

"A lot of people don't have much food on their table But they got a lot of forks and knives And they gotta cut something"

"I'm out here a thousand miles from my home Walkin' a road other men have gone down I'm seein' your world of people and things Your paupers and peasants and princes and kings"

"Hey, hey, Woody Guthrie, I wrote you a song, 'Bout a funny ol' world that's a-comin' along Seems sick an' it's hungry, it's tired an' it's torn It looks like it's a-dyin' an' it's hardly been born"

"Here's to Cisco an' Sonny an' Lead Belly too An' to all the good people that traveled with you Here's to the hearts and the hands of the men That come with the dust and are gone with the wind"

"How many roads must a man walk down before you call him a man? How many seas must a white dove sail before she sleeps in the sand?"

"Yes, and how many years can a mountain exist before it is washed to the sea?"

"How many times can a man turn his head pretending he just doesn't see?"

"How many times must a man look up before he can see the sky?"

"Yes, and how many deaths will it take till he knows that too many people have died?"

"The answer, my friend, is blowin' in the wind."

"So if you're travelin' in the north country fair, Where the winds hit heavy on the borderline, Remember me to one who lives there. She once was a true love of mine."

"But I see through your eyes"

"All the money you made will never buy back your soul."

"You ain't worth the blood that runs in your veins."

"There is one thing I know though I'm younger than you Even Jesus would not forgive what you do"

"And I hope that you die And your death'll come soon I will follow your casket In the pale afternoon And I'll watch while you're lowered Down to your deathbed And I'll stand o'er your grave 'Til I'm sure that you're dead"

"Oh, where have you been, my blue-eyed son? And where have you been, my darling young one?"

"I saw a newborn baby with wild wolves all around it."

"I saw ten thousand talkers whose tongues were all broken."

"I heard the roar of a wave that could drown the whole world."

"I heard one hundred drummers whose hands were a-blazin'."

"I met a white man who walked a black dog."

"And I'll tell it and speak it and think it and breathe it."

"But I'll know my song well before I start singin'."

"It's a hard rain's a-gonna fall."

"It ain't no use to sit and wonder why, babe If you don't know by now"

"I once loved a woman, a child I am told I gave her my heart but she wanted my soul."

"I'm walkin' down that long, lonesome road, babe Where I'm bound, I can't tell But goodbye's too good a word, babe So I'll just say fare thee well"

"I ain't saying you treated me unkind You could have done better but I don't mind You just kinda wasted my precious time But don't think twice, it's all right."

"I got into the driver's seat and drove down 42nd Street in my Cadillac. Good car to drive after a war."

"Half of the people can be part right all of the time, Some of the people can be all right part of the time, But all the people can't be all right all the time. I think Abraham Lincoln said that. I'll let you be in my dreams if I can be in yours. I said that."

"Come gather ’round people Wherever you roam And admit that the waters Around you have grown. And accept it that soon You’ll be drenched to the bone. If your time to you is worth savin’ Then you better start swimmin' or you'll sink like a stone For the times they are a-changin'."

"Come writers and critics Who prophesize with your pen And keep your eyes wide The chance won't come again And don't speak too soon For the wheel's still in spin And there's no tellin' who that it's naming.’ For the loser now will be later to win"

"Come mothers and fathers Throughout the land And don't criticize What you can't understand Your sons and your daughters Are beyond your command Your old road is rapidly agin'."

"Come Congressmen, Senators, please heed the call Don't stand in the doorway, don't block up the hall For he who gets hurt will be he who has stalled There’s a battle outside and it's ragin’."

"You prayed to the Lord above Oh please send you a friend Your empty pockets tell yuh That you ain't a-got no friend"

"There's seven people dead On a South Dakota farm Somewhere in the distance There's seven new people born"

"If there's anyone who knows, is there anyone who cares?"

"You never ask questions When God's on your side"

"You don't count the dead When God's on your side"

"But I can't think for you You'll have to decide Whether Judas Iscariot Had God on his side"

"The words fill my head, and fall to the floor, that if God's on our side, he'll stop the next war."

"Oh all the money that in my whole life I did spend Be it mine right or wrongfully I let it slip gladly past the hands of my friends To tie up the time most forcefully"

"But if the arrow is straight And the point is slick It can pierce through dust no matter how thick"

"Oh, but if I had the stars from the darkest night And the diamonds from the deepest ocean I'd forsake them all for your sweet kiss For that's all I'm wishin' to be ownin'."

"Well, if you, my love, must think that-a-way, I'm sure your mind is roamin'. I'm sure your heart is not with me, But with the country to where you're goin'."

"William Zanzinger killed poor Hattie Carroll With a cane that he twirled around his Diamond ring finger At a Baltimore hotel society gath‘rin‘ And the cops were called in and his weapon took from him As they rode him in custody down to the station And booked William Zanzinger for first-degree murder But you who philosophize disgrace and criticize all fears Take the rag away from your face Now ain‘t the time for your tears."

"William Zanzinger, who at twenty-four years Owns a tobacco farm of six hundred acres With rich wealthy parents who provide and protect him And high office relations in the politics of Maryland Reacted to his deed with a shrug of his shoulders And swear words and sneering, and his tongue it was snarling In a matter of minutes on bail was out walking But you who philosophize disgrace and criticize all fears Take the rag away from your face Now ain‘t the time for your tears."

"Hattie Carroll was a maid of the kitchen She was fifty-one years old and gave birth to ten children Who carried the dishes and took out the garbage And never sat once at the head of the table And didn‘t even talk to the people at the table Who just cleande up all the food from the table And emptied the ashtrays in a whole other level Got killed by a blow, lay slain by a cane That sailed through the air and came down through the room Doomed and determined to destroy all the gentle And she never done nothing to William Zanzinger But you who philosophize disgrace and criticize all fears Take the rag away from your face Now ain‘t the time for your tears."

"In the courtroom of honor, the judge pounded his gravel To show that all‘s equal and that the courts are on the level And the strings in the books ain‘t pulled and persuaded And that even the nobles get properly handled Once that the cops have chased after and caught ´em And that the ladder of law has no top and no bottom Stared at the person who killed for no reason Who just happened to be feelin‘ that way without warnin‘ And he spoke through his cloak, most deep and distinguished And handed out strongly, for penalty and repentance William Zanzinger with a six-month sentence Oh, but you who philosophize disgrace and criticize all fears Bury the rag deep in your face For now‘s the time for your tears."

"All I really want to do is, baby, be friends with you."

"I ain't looking for you to feel like me, see like me, or be like me."

"Far between sundown's finish an' midnight's broken toll, We ducked inside the doorway, thunder crashing. As majestic bells of bolts struck shadows in the sounds, Seeming to be the chimes of freedom flashing. Flashing for the warriors whose strength is not to fight, Flashing for the refugees on the unarmed road of flight, An' for each an' ev'ry underdog soldier in the night, An' we gazed upon the chimes of freedom flashing."

"Through the mad mystic hammering of the wild ripping hail, The sky cracked its poems in naked wonder, That the clinging of the church bells blew far into the breeze Leaving only bells of lightning and its thunder Striking for the gentle, striking for the kind, Striking for the guardians and protectors of the mind, An' the poet and the painter far behind his rightful time An' we gazed upon the chimes of freedom flashing."

"It ain't no use a-talking to me It's just the same as talking to you"

"I'm a poet, and I know it."

"Everything passes Everything changes Just do what you think you should do And someday maybe Who knows, baby I'll come and be cryin' to you"

"Ah, but I was so much older then, I'm younger than that now."

"Half-wracked prejudice leaped forth "Rip down all hate," I screamed Lies that life is black and white Spoke from my skull."

"In a soldier's stance, I aimed my hand at the mongrel dogs who teach Fearing not that I'd become my enemy in the instant that I preach My existence led by confusion boats, mutiny from stern to bow."

"I had to say something to strike him very weird so I yelled out "I like Fidel Castro and his beard.""

"All is gone, all is gone, admit it, take flight. I gagged twice, doubled, tears blinding my sight. My mind it was mangled, I ran into the night Leaving all of love's ashes behind me. The wind knocks my window, the room it is wet. The words to say I'm sorry, I haven't found yet. I think of her often and hope whoever she's met Will be fully aware of how precious she is. Ah, my friends from the prison, they ask unto me, "How good, how good does it feel to be free?" And I answer them most mysteriously, "Are birds free from the chains of the skyway?""

"Go away from my window, Leave at your own chosen speed, I'm not the one you want, babe, I'm not the one you need. You say you're looking for someone, Who's never weak but always strong, To protect you and defend you, Whether you are right or wrong, Someone to open each and every door, But it ain't me, babe, No, no, no, it ain't me, babe, It ain't me you're looking for, babe."

"Johnny's in the basement Mixing up the medicine I'm on the pavement Thinking about the government The man in the trenchcoat Badge out, laid off Says he's got a bad cough Wants to get it paid off Look out kid It's somethin' you did God knows when But you're doin' it again"

"You don't need a weather man To know which way the wind blows"

"Get jailed, jump bail Join the army, if you fail"

"Don't follow leaders Watch the parkin' meters"

"Twenty years of schoolin' And they put you on the day shift"

"The pump don't work 'Cause the vandals took the handles"

"She's got everything she needs, she's an artist, she don't look back."

"She could take the dark out the nighttime and paint the daytime black."

"You will start out standing, proud to steal her anything she sees, but you will wind up peeking through her keyhole down upon your knees."

"Well, I try my best To be just like I am But everybody wants you To be just like them"

"I ain't gonna work on Maggie's farm no more."

"There's no success like failure, and failure's no success at all."

"She knows too much to argue or to judge."

"In the dime stores and bus stations, People talk of situations, Read books repeat quotations, Draw conclusions on the wall."

"Don't ask me nothin' about nothin'. I just might tell you the truth."

"I said, "You know they refused Jesus, too" He said, "You're not Him""

"The ancient empty street's too dead for dreaming."

"And if you hear vague traces of skipping reels of rhyme..."

"It's not aimed at anyone, it's just escapin' on the run"

"Take me disappearing, through the smoke rings of my mind, down the foggy ruins of time..."

"Yes, to dance beneath the diamond sky with one hand waving free."

"With all memory and fate driven deep beneath the waves, let me forget about today until tomorrow."

"Hey, Mr. Tambourine Man, play a song for me. I'm not sleepy and there is no place I'm going to. Hey, Mr. Tambourine Man, play a song for me. In the jingle-jangle morning, I'll come following you."

"All and all can only fall with a crushing but meaningless blow."

"And there are no truths outside the Gates of Eden."

"Of war and peace the truth just twist, its curfew gull it glides."

"Darkness at the break of noon Shadows even the silver spoon The handmade blade, the child's balloon Eclipses both the sun and moon To understand you know too soon There is no sense in trying"

"He not busy being born is busy dying"

"Others say, don't hate nothing at all except hatred"

"Disillusioned words like bullets bark As human gods aim for their mark Make everything from toy guns that spark To flesh-colored Christs that glow in the dark It's easy to see without looking too far That not much is really sacred"

"Even the President of the United States Sometimes must have to stand naked"

"It is not he or she or them or it That you belong to."

"While one who sings with his tongue on fire Gargles in the rat race choir"

"Money doesn't talk, it swears"

"You must leave, now take what you need, You think will last But whatever you wish to keep, you better grab it fast Yonder stands your orphan with his gun Crying like a fire in the sun."

"The highway is for gamblers, better use your sense."

"Your lover who just walked out the door, has taken all his blankets from your floor."

"Leave your stepping stones behind, something calls for you. Forget the dead you've left, they will not follow you. Strike another match, go! Start anew And it's all over now, Baby Blue."

"You got a lotta nerve to say you are my friend. When I was down, you just stood there grinning."

"Do you take me for such a fool to think I'd make contact with one that tries to hide what he don't know to begin with."

"I wish that for just one time you could stand inside my shoes. You'd know what a drag it is to see you."

"How does it feel? To be on your own, with no direction home, like a complete unknown, like a rolling stone?"

"Once upon a time you dressed so fine, threw the bums a dime in your prime, didn't you. People call, say beware doll, you're bound to fall, you thought they were all, kiddin you."

"You used to laugh about Everybody that was hangin' out Now you don't talk so loud Now you don't seem so proud About having to be scrounging for your next meal"

"You never turned around to see the frowns, on the jugglers and the clowns when they all did, tricks for you."

"Princess on the steeple and all the pretty people, they're drinkin', thinkin' that they got it made"

"Go to him now, he calls you, you can't refuse. When you ain't got nothing, you got nothing to lose. You're invisible now. You've got no secrets to conceal."

"The sweet pretty things are in bed now, of course."

"The sun's not yellow, it's chicken."

"Stop all this weeping, swallow your pride, you will not die, it's not poison"

"The geometry of innocent flesh on the bone Causes Galileo's math book to get thrown At Delilah's who sitting worthlessly alone But the tears on her cheeks are from laughter"

"And the National Bank at a profit sells road maps for the soul To the old folks home and the college"

"Well I ride on a mail train baby, can't buy a thrill."

"Don't the moon look good, mama, shinin' through the trees? Don't the brakeman look good, mama, flaggin' down the double E? Don't the sun look good goin' down over the sea?"

"And you say, Oh my God, am I here all alone?"

"You've been with the professors and they've all liked your looks. With great lawyers you've discussed lepers and crooks."

"You go watch the geek, who immediately walks up to you when he hears you speak, and says, how does it feel to be such a freak?, and you say, impossible as he hands you a bone."

"And something is happening here, but you don't know what it is, do you Mr. Jones?"

"Here's your throat back, thanks for the loan."

"You put your eyes in your pockets and your nose on the ground."

"They already expect you to just give a check to tax-deductible charity organization."

"Oh God said to Abraham, Kill me a son. Abe says, Man, you must be puttin' me on. God say, No. Abe say, What? God say, You can do what you want Abe, but the next time you see me comin' you better run. Well Abe says, Where do you want this killin' done? God says, Out on Highway 61."

"The cops don't need you, and, man, they expect the same."

"I started out on burgundy but soon hit the harder stuff."

"They're selling postcards of the hanging"

"Yes, I received your letter yesterday (About the time the door knob broke) When you asked how I was doing Was that some kind of joke? All these people that you mention Yes, I know them, they're quite lame I had to rearrange their faces And give them all another name Right now I can't read too good Don't send me no more letters no Not unless you mail them From Desolation Row"

"Now at midnight all the agents And the superhuman crew Come out and round up everyone That knows more than they do"

"The Titanic sails at dawn"

"And Ezra Pound and T. S. Eliot Fighting in the captain's tower While calypso singers laugh at them And fishermen hold flowers..."

"Ron Rosenbaum: When you hear your songs in your mind, it's not just you strumming alone, you mean?"

"Dylan: Well, no, it is to begin with. But then I always hear other instruments, how they should sound. The closest I ever got to the sound I hear in my mind was on individual bands in the Blonde on Blonde album. It's that thin, that wild mercury sound. It's metallic and bright gold, with whatever that conjures up. That's my particular sound. I haven't been able to succeed in getting it all the time. Mostly, I've been driving at a combination of guitar, harmonica and organ, but now I find myself going into territory that has more percussion in it and [pause] rhythms of the soul."

"But I would not feel so all alone, everybody must get stoned!"

"Somebody got lucky, but it was an accident."

"Oh Mama, can this really be the end? To be stuck inside of Mobile with the Memphis blues again?"

"And here I sit so patiently waiting to find out what price you have to pay to get out of going through all these things twice."

"The one was Texas medicine, the other was just a railroad gin. And, like a fool, I mixed them; and it strangled up my mind."

"Your debutante just knows what you need, but I know what you want."

"You see, you're just like me. I hope you're satisfied."

"Ain't it just like the night to play tricks when you're trying to be so quiet?"

"We sit here stranded, though we're all doin' our best to deny it."

"He's sure got a lotta gall to be so useless and all"

"Inside the museums, infinity goes up on trial. Voices echo this is what salvation must be like after a while But Mona Lisa must have had the highway blues You can tell by the way she smiles"

"The ghost of electricity howls in the bones of her face."

"Name me someone that's not a parasite and I'll go out and say a prayer for him."

"But these visions of Johanna, they make it all seem so cruel."

"She is good to me And there's nothing she doesn't see She knows where I'd like to be But it doesn't matter"

"Well, I see you got your brand new leopard-skin pill-box hat Yes, I see you got your brand new leopard-skin pill-box hat Well, you must tell me, baby How your head feels under somethin' like that Under your brand new leopard-skin pill-box hat"

"I asked the doctor if I could see you It's bad for your health, he said Well, I disobeyed his orders, I came to see you but I found him there instead Well, I don't mind him cheating on me but I sure wish he'd take that off his head Your brand new leopard-skin pill-box hat"

"She takes just like a woman, yes she does She makes love just like a woman, yes she does And she aches just like a woman But she breaks just like a little girl."

"You say you love me and you're thinking of me, but you know you might be wrong."

"But to live outside the law, you must be honest."

"And now here I stand, looking at your yellow railroad, in the ruins of your balcony"

"Sad-eyed lady of the lowlands, Where the sad-eyed prophet says that no man comes, My warehouse eyes, my Arabian drums, Should I leave them by your gate, Or, sad-eyed lady, should I wait?"

"With your sheets like metal and your belt like lace, And your deck of cards missing the jack and the ace, And your basement clothes and your hollow face, Who among them can think he could outguess you?"

""There must be some way out of here," said the Joker to the Thief"

"All along the watchtower, princes kept the view While all the women came and went, barefoot servants too Outside in the distance, a wild cat did growl Two riders were approaching. The wind began to howl."

"I put my fingers against the glass, and bowed my head and cried"

"Nothing is revealed"

"Lay, lady, lay. Lay across my big, brass bed."

"Whatever colors you have in your mind, I'll show them to you and you'll see them shine."

"His clothes are dirty, but his hands are clean, and you're the best thing that he's ever seen."

"Throw my ticket out the window, Throw my suitcase out there too, Throw my troubles out the door, I don't need them anymore, 'Cause tonight I'll be staying here with you."

"Ev'rybody's in despair, Ev'ry girl and boy But when Quinn the Eskimo gets here, Ev'rybody's gonna jump for joy."

"Come all without, come all within, You'll not see nothing like the mighty Quinn."

"Time passes slowly up here in the mountains"

"Some day everything is gonna be different, when I paint my masterpiece."

"May you build a ladder to the stars and climb on every rung. May your song always be sung, May you stay forever young."

"May your hands always be busy. May your feet always be swift. May you have a strong foundation when the winds of changes shift. May your heart always be joyful. May your song always be sung. May you stay forever young."

"Early one mornin' the sun was shinin', I was layin' in bed Wond'rin'if she'd changed at all If her hair was still red."

"Tangled up in blue..."

"Lord knows I've paid some dues gettin' through..."

"I helped her out of a jam, I guess, but I used a little too much force..."

"And every one of them words rang true and glowed like burnin' coal. Pourin' off of every page, like it was written in my soul from me to you..."

"The only thing I knew how to do was to keep on keepin' on like a bird that flew..."

"All the people we used to know, they're an illusion to me now..."

"Don't know how it all got started, I don't know what they do with their lives..."

"We always did feel the same, we just saw it from a different point of view..."

"But all the while I was alone The past was close behind, I seen a lot of women But she never escaped my mind,"

"I lived with them on Montague Street In a basement down the stairs There was music in the cafes at night And revolution in the air."

"You're an idiot, babe. It's a wonder that you still know how to breathe."

"I can't help it if I'm lucky."

"Visions of your chestnut mare shoot through my head and are makin' me see stars."

"I waited for you on the running boards, near the cypress trees, while the springtime turned slowly into autumn."

"Idiot wind, blowing through the buttons of our coats, blowing through the letters that we wrote. Idiot wind, blowing through the dust upon our shelves, We're idiots, babe. It's a wonder we can even feed ourselves."

"It was gravity which pulled us in and destiny which broke us apart"

"You tamed the lion in my cage but it just wasn't enough to change my heart"

"Down the highway, down the tracks, down the road to ecstacy, I followed you beneath the stars, hounded by your memory and all your ragin' glory"

"You'll never know the hurt I suffer, nor the pain I rise above, and I'll never know the same about you..."

"I kiss good-bye the howling beast on the borderline which separated you from me."

"I'm going out of my mind, oh, oh; with a pain that stops and starts; like a corkscrew to my heart; Ever since we've been apart"

"A change in the weather is known to be extreme; but what's the sense in changing horses in mid-stream?"

"Time is a jetplane — it moves too fast. Oh but what a shame that all we've shared can't last..."

"Love is so simple, to quote a phrase; you've known it all the time, I'm learnin' it these days."

"I know where I can find you — in somebody's room. It's the price I have to pay, you're a big girl all the way."

"Backstage the girls were playin' five-card stud by the stairs, Lily had two queens, she was hopin' for a third to match her pair. Outside the streets were fillin' up, the window was open wide, A gentle breeze was blowin', you could feel it from inside. Lily called another bet and drew up the Jack of Hearts."

"'Twas in another lifetime, one of toil and blood When blackness was a virtue, the road was full of mud. I came in from the wilderness, a creature void of form, 'Come in,' she said, 'I'll give you shelter from the storm.'"

"Beauty walks a razor's edge, someday I'll make it mine."

"Try imagining a place where it's always safe and warm..."

"I always have respected her for doin' what she did and gettin' free"

"Say for me that I'm all right though things get kind of slow She might think that I've forgotten her don't tell her it isn't so."

"Sundown yellow moon I replay the past I know every scene by heart they all went by so fast"

"If she's passing back this way I'm not that hard to find Tell her she can look me up if she's got the time."

"Well, it's sugar for sugar And salt for salt If you go down in the flood It's gonna be your own fault"

"Take care of all your memories. said my friend Mick, For you cannot relive them."

"If your mem'ry serves you well, we were gonna meet again and wait, so I think I'll just unpack my bags and sit before it gets too late. No man alive will come to you with another tale to tell, but you know that we shall meet again, if your mem'ry serves you well."

"If your memory serves you well, I was gonna confiscate your lace and wrap it up in a sailor's knot and hide it in your case. And if I knew for sure that it was yours, it was oh so hard to tell, and you know that we shall meet again, if your memory serves you well."

"If your memory serves you well, I remember you're the one who called out me to call out them to get your business done. And after every plan has failed, and there was nothing left to tell, well you knew that we shall meet again if your memory serves you well."

"Wheels on fire, rolling down the road, best notify my next of kin, this wheel shall explode!"

"Here comes the story of The Hurricane, the man the authorities came to blame for something that he never done. Put in a prison cell, but one time he coulda been the champion of the world."

"Meanwhile, far away in another part of town, Rubin Carter and a couple of friends are drivin’ around. Number one contender for the middleweight crown, Had no idea what kinda shit was about to go down. When a cop pulled him over to the side of the road, Just like the time before and the time before that. In Paterson that’s just the way things go: If you’re black you might as well not show up on the street ’Less you wanna draw the heat."

"Couldn't help but make me feel ashamed to live in a land, where justice is a game."

"There's lots of pretty girls in Mozambique."

"Don't turn away, you'll create sorrow, Time is an ocean but it ends at the shore, You may not see me tomorrow."

"Gentlemen, he said I don't need your organization, I've shined your shoes I've moved your mountains and marked your cards But Eden is burning either get ready for elimination Or else your hearts must have the courage for the changing of the guards Peace will come with tranquility and splendor on the wheels of fire But will offer no reward when her false idols fall And cruel death surrenders with its pale ghost retreating Between the King and the Queen of Swords"

"Señor, señor, can you tell me where we’re heading? Lincoln County Road or Armageddon?"

"Do you love me, or are you just extending good will?"

"I have dined with kings, I've been offered wings, and I've never been too impressed"

"It may be the Devil or it may be the Lord, but you're gonna have to serve somebody."

"You may call me Bobby; you may call me Zimmy..."

"Now there's spiritual warfare, flesh and blood breaking down. You either got faith or you got unbelief, and there ain't no neutral ground."

"The enemy is subtle. How be it we're deceived? When the truth's in our hearts and we still don't believe."

"My so-called friends have fallen under a spell: they look me squarely in the eye and say, "Well; all is well.""

"We are covered in blood, girl. You know both our forefathers were slaves. Let us hope they've found mercy in their bone-filled graves."

"They'd like to drive me from this town; they don't want me around, 'cause I believe in you."

"I believe in you even on the morning after."

"Have they counted the cost it'll take to bring down all the earthly principles they're gonna have to abandon?"

"All that foreign oil controlling American soil. Look around you, it's just bound to make you embarrassed: sheiks walking around like kings, wearing fancy jewels and nose rings, deciding America's future from Amsterdam and to Paris."

"In the home of the brave, Jefferson turning over in his grave."

"Man's ego's inflated, his laws are outdated. They don't apply no more. You can't rely no more to be standing around waiting."

"Fools glorify themselves, trying to manipulate Satan."

"The enemy I see wears a cloak of decency."

"People starving and thirsting; grain elevators are bursting. You know, it costs more to store the food than it do to give it."

"They talk about a life of brotherly love? Show me someone who knows how to live it."

"It sure do bother me to see my loved ones turning into puppets."

"(Alternate version.) A brave man will kill you with a sword, a coward with a kiss."

"Don't wanna judge nobody — don't wanna be judged."

"You got some big dreams, baby, but in order to dream you gotta still be asleep."

"Counterfeit philosophies have polluted all of your thoughts; Karl Marx has got you by the throat, and Henry Kissinger's got you tied up into knots."

"You got innocent men in jail, your insane asylums are filled."

"Do you ever wonder just what God requires? You think he's just an errand boy to satisfy your wandering desires."

"They tell you "Time is money," as if your life was worth its weight in gold."

"When you gonna wake up and strengthen the things that remain?"

"Truth is an arrow, and the gate is narrow that it passes through."

"In the fury of the moment I can see the Master's hand In every leaf that trembles, in every grain of sand"

"I am hanging in the balance of the reality of man Like every sparrow falling, like every grain of sand"

"Freedom just around the corner for you, but with truth so far off, what good will it do?"

"Fools rush in where angels fear to tread, both of their futures so full of dread."

"Shedding off one more layer of skin, keeping one step ahead of the persecutor within."

"You go to Sodom and Gomorrah, but what do you care? Ain't nobody there would want to marry your sister."

"You look into the fiery furnace, see the rich man without any name."

"The book of Leviticus and Deuteronomy, the law of the jungle and the sea are your only teachers."

"The rifleman's stalking the sick and the lame; preacherman seeks the same. Who'll get there first is uncertain."

"A woman just gave birth to a prince today and dressed him in scarlet. He'll put the priest in his pocket, put the blade to the heat, take the motherless children off the street and place them at the feet of a harlot."

"A woman like you should be at home. That's where you belong, taking care of somebody nice who don't know how to do you wrong."

"Just how much abuse will you be able to take? Well, there's no way to tell by the first kiss."

"They say in your father's house there's many mansions; each one of 'em got a fireproof floor."

"They say that patriotism is the last refuge to which a scoundrel clings."

"Steal a little and they throw you in jail; steal a lot and they make you king."

"There's only one step down from here, baby. It's called the Land of Permanent Bliss."

"Sometimes Satan comes as a man of peace."

"Nobody sees through him — no, not even the chief of police."

"He could be standing next to you, the person that you notice least."

"He's following a star, the same one that the three men followed east."

"Some one else is speaking with my mouth, but I'm listening only to my heart."

"Took a stranger to teach me to look into justice's beautiful face, and to see an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth."

"A lot of people complaining that there is no work. I say, "Why you say that for?" When nothin' you got is US-made — they don't make nothin' here no more."

"Capitalism is above the law; it's said it don't count 'less it sells."

"It's sundown on the union that was made in the USA. Sure was a good idea till greed got in the way."

"Democracy don't rule the world; you'd better get that in your head. This world is ruled by violence."

"Yesterday's just a memory; tomorrow's never what it's supposed to be."

"Man thinks 'cause he rules the earth, he can do with it as he please. And if things don't change soon, he will."

"For man has invented his doom; first step was touching the moon."

"Man is opposed to fair play: he wants it all, and he wants it his way."

"What looks large from a distance, close up ain't never that big."

"I live in another world, where life and death are memorized."

"I can hear another drum beating for the dead that rise, whom Nature's beast fears as they come."

"Time is short and the days are sweet and passion rules the arrow that flies."

"All I see are dark eyes."

"If you want somebody you can trust, trust yourself."

"I've been deceived by the clown inside of me. I thought that he was righteous but he's vain."

"My patron saint is a-fighting with a ghost. He's always off somewhere when I need him most."

"Let me feel your love one more time before I abandon it."

"I was just too stubborn to ever be governed by enforced insanity."

"If I thought about it, I never would have done it, I guess I would have let it slide."

"The old Rounder in the iron mask slipped me the master key, somebody had to unlock your heart, he said it was up to me."

"It frightens me the awful truth of how sweet life can be."

"When you bite off more than you can chew, you pay the penalty, somebody's got to tell the tale, I guess it must be up to me."

"Somebody's got to cry some tears, I guess it must be up to me."

"Forgive me, baby, for what I didn't do."

"[Recounting a scene in The Gunfighter] Turn him loose, let him go, let him say he outdrew me fair and square — I want him to feel what it's like to every moment face his death."

"I can't believe we've lived so long and are still so far apart."

"I know she ain't you, but she's here, and she's got that dark rhythm in her soul."

"She said, "Welcome to the land of the living dead," but you could tell she was so brokenhearted — she said, "Even the swap meets around here are getting pretty corrupt.""

"We're going all the way, till the wheels fall off and burn, till the sun peels the paint and the seat covers fade and the water moccasins die."

"I didn't know whether to duck or to run, so I ran."

"When I saw you break down in front of the judge and cry real tears, it was the best damn thing I saw anybody do."

"I've always been the kind of person who doesn't like to trespass, but sometimes you just find yourself over the line."

"I feel pretty good, but that ain't saying much — I could feel a whole lot better, if you were just here by my side to show me how."

"The only thing we knew for sure about Henry Porter was that his name wasn't Henry Porter."

"Strange how people who suffer together have stronger connections than those who are most content."

"You always said people don't do what they believe in; they just do what's most convenient, then they repent."

"Tweeter and the Monkey Man were hard up for cash They stayed up all night selling cocaine and hash To an undercover cop who had a sister named Jan Who for reasons unexplained she loved the Monkey Man"

"Jan had told him many times "it was you to me who taught: in Jersey anything's legal as long as you don't get caught""

"We live in a political world Where peace is not welcome at all It's turned away from the door to wander some more Or put up against the wall."

"Ring them bells Sweet Martha For the poor man's son Ring them bells so the world will know That God is one Oh, the shepherd is asleep Where the willows weep And the mountains are filled with lost sheep."

"There are no mistakes in life, some people say And it's true, sometimes you can see it that way People don't live or die, people just float She went with the man in the long black coat."

"There’s smoke on the water, it’s been there since June Tree trunks uprooted, 'neath the high crescent moon Feel the pulse and vibration and the rumbling force Somebody is out there beating on a dead horse"

"Seen a shooting star tonight, and I thought of you."

"They'll kick you when you're up and knock you when you're down."

"Your mind is your temple, keep it beautiful and free. Don't let an egg get laid in it by something you can't see."

"Let me die in my footsteps before I go under the ground."

"I'd throw all the guns and the tanks in the sea, for they are mistakes of a past history."

"The whole world's a bottle, And life's but a dram, When the bottle gets empty, It sure ain't worth a damn."

"When you cease to exist, then who will you blame?"

"Well, God is in His heaven And we all want what's his But power and greed and corruptible seed Seem to be all that there is I'm gazing out the window Of the St. James Hotel And I know no one can sing the blues Like Blind Willie McTell"

"Drinkin' man listens to the voice he hears, In a crowded room full of covered up mirrors, Lookin' into the lost forgotten years For dignity"

"I'm sick of love, and I'm in the thick of it."

"Last night I danced with a stranger, but she just reminded me you were the one."

"Behind every beautiful thing there's been some kind of pain"

"I know it looks like I'm moving, but I'm standing still Every nerve in my body is so vacant and numb I can't even remember what it was I came here to get away from."

"I been down on the bottom of a whirlpool of lies"

"Don't even hear the murmur of a prayer. It's not dark yet, but it's getting there."

"I could hold you for a million years"

"When you think that you’ve lost everything, you find out you can always lose a little more."

"She says, you don’t read women authors do you?... I said, You’re way wrong. She says, Which ones have you read then? I say, I read Erica Jong!"

"Insanity is crashing up against my soul."

"Feel like falling in love with the first woman I meet... Putting her in a wheel barrow and wheeling her down the street."

"People are crazy and times are strange I'm locked in tight, I'm out of range, I used to care, but things have changed."

"You can hurt someone and not even know it"

"I been walkin forty miles of bad road. If the Bible is right the world will explode. I've been trying to get as far away from myself as I can"

"My clothes are wet, tight on my skin. Not as tight as the corner that I've painted myself in."

"You can always come back, but you can't come back all the way."

"I'm walking through the leaves falling from the trees, Feelin' like a stranger nobody sees."

"So many things that we never will undo I know you're sorry, I'm sorry too."

"I'm drownin' in the poison, got not future got no past."

"But my heart is not weary; it's light and it's free I've got nothing but affection for those who've sailed with me."

"Everybody movin', if they ain't already there. Everyboy got to move somewhere."

"Things should start to get interesting right about now."

"Politician's got on his jogging shoes, he must be running for office, got no time to lose"

"I'm sittin' on my watch so I can be on time."

"The future for me is already a thing of the past."

"I'm gonna baptize you in fire so you can sin no more."

"Funny how the things you have the hardest time parting with are the things you need the least."

"I'm gonna spare the defeated—I'm gonna speak to the crowd I'm gonna spare the defeated, boys, I'm going to speak to the crowd I am goin' to teach peace to the conquered I'm gonna tame the proud"

"Down over the window Comes the dazzling sunlit rays Through the back alleys, through the blinds Another one of them endless days"

"My old man he's like some feudal lord, got more lives than a cat."

"Jump into the wagon, love, throw your panties overboard."

"I can write you poems, make a strong man lose his mind."

"As great as you are, man, you’ll never be greater than yourself."

"Don’t reach out for me, she said. Can’t you see I’m drowning too?"

"Last night across the alley there was a pounding on the wall It must have been Don Pascuale making a two a.m. booty call"

"Gonna forget about myself for a while, gonna go out and see what others need."

"Feel like my soul is beginning to expand. Look into my heart and you will sort of understand."

"The world of research has gone berserk. Too much paperwork."

"Some people never work a day in their lives, don't know what work even means."

"If I catch my opponents ever sleepin', I'll just slaughter 'em where they lie."

"I'm listening to Billy Joe Shaver And I'm reading James Joyce Some people they tell me I've got the blood of the land in my voice"

"The door has closed for evermore, If indeed there ever was a door."

"Just give to me my gravestone With it clearly carved upon: "I'm a long time a-comin' An' I'll be a long time gone""

"She left one too many a boy behind He committed suicide"

"It's soon after midnight, and I got a date with a fairy queen"

"Another politician pumpin' out the piss."

"He bent in the middle like a twisted pin"

"Long before the First Crusade, way back before England or America was made."

"Mr. Freud with his dreams, Mr. Marx with his ax."

"Who cleared the path for Presley to sing Who carved out the path for Martin Luther King"

"I lit the torch, I looked to the east, and I crossed the Rubicon."

"I’m so deep in love that I can hardly see."

"Well, it might not be the thing to do, but I’m sticking with you through and through."

"Bob Dylan's enormous influence on mid-'60s rock not only led directly to the birth of folk rock but also inspired the psychedelic rockers who followed."

"He might rarely pick up a six-string these days, but back in the day, Dylan started a folk revolution with nothing but a beat-up old acoustic and a suitcase full of songs. Dylan made it look so easy that a legion of earnest young strummers picked up the guitar. They discovered the truth when they started trying to play like him, though. Elaborate fingerpicking, open tunings, ear-catching runs and an impeccable sense of rhythm were the foundation that the Dylan legend was built on. He sourced his skills from legends of folk and blues, and combined them into something bitingly original. Hands down the best singer-songwriter ever to do it."

"It took Bob Dylan to break the ice between the [country and rock music] camps. [...] While it would be a stretch to call Blonde on Blonde a country-rock record, the fact that Dylan, arguably the most important person in rock at the time, cut an album in the home of country music soon brought an influx of other musicians to Nashville. As Charlie McCoy, the multi-instrumentalist who starred on Blonde told Nashville Scene in 2011, “That's when the floodgates opened.""

"The Nobel Prize for Literature is yet another step towards immortality for Bob Dylan. The rebellious, reclusive, unpredictable artist/composer is exactly where the Nobel Prize for Literature needs to be. His gift with words is unsurpassable. Out of my repertoire spanning 60 years, no songs have been more moving and worthy in their depth, darkness, fury, mystery, beauty and humour than Bob's. None has been more of a pleasure to sing. None will come again."

"A voice like sand and glue."

"To me, [giving the Nobel Prize to Bob Dylan] is like pinning a medal on Mount Everest for being the highest mountain."

"I relied on Bob Dylan as a seer who literally channeled the mood of the revolution. His John Wesley Harding album, named for a famous outlaw, had thrilled me the year before, especially "All Along the Watchtower," which seemed to me a coda for revolution. Some of the women in our group and many in the new women's movement had turned against Dylan and other artists for their misogyny, and I couldn't deny its presence in many lyrics."

"In the mid-'60s one of my cousins gave me a record by Bob Dylan and it was a mind-blowing experience. I loved the beat of it, the folk concerns, the pulse of the people in Dylan's music."

"Dylan is to me the perfect symbol of the anti-artist in our society. He is against everything—the last resort of someone who doesn't really want to change the world. ... I think his poetry is punk. It's derivative and terribly old hat. ... Dylan songs accept the world as it is."

"Bob Dylan took a lot of air out of the room when it came to songwriters. Everybody had a tough row to hoe distinguishing themselves once Bob invented our job."

"I saw Bob Dylan a couple of weeks ago (this being, what, December 1994?) and he was saying… “Who owns all the money? Who owns the media?”. As he travels around the world, he notices that all the media change their story every week, and someone is directing that. And “Who owns all the money?”, he was saying. And it was like he knew that he had a great deal of power, to influence people’s psyches, or minds, or thinking, or psychology, or opinion-ation, and yet his power was miniscule, compared to the power of the moguls of the media. And in America it’s only 22 people who run… who own… 80 percent of the mass-media, so that the… it would be very difficult for a poem… for a poet… to overcome that barrage of bullshit. On the other hand, poetry is the only place where you get an individual person telling his subjective truth, what he really thinks, as distinct from what he wants people to think he thinks (like a politician or someone preparing an editorial in a dignified newspaper). So if you need the historical truth of what people think inside, you have to follow Shelley (and his admonition is that poets are the “unacknowledged legislators of the race”) — or what William Carlos Williams said more acutely was, “The government is of words”. After all, the people making political speeches, they’re writing prose, if not poetry, and they are trying to get a little flowery language in there, but the language is shifty, and the language is manipulative, and people who are advertising, or even doing ordinary mass-media, are still inhibited and can’t say what they really think, but the poet can say what he really thinks, authentically, and that’s the advantage, and it’s longer-lasting than the immediate radio-broadcast or television-broadcast, because a poem is like a radio that can broadcast continually, for thousands of years. And so, in the long run, it may have an ameliorating effect on the spirit."

"What I wanted to do with Bobby was just to get him to sound in the studio as natural, just as he was in person, and have that extraordinary personality come thru. ... After all, he's not a great harmonica player, and he's not a great guitar player, and he's not a great singer. He just happens to be an original. And I just wanted to have that originality come thru."

"The minute you try to grab hold of Dylan, he's no longer where he was. He's like a flame: If you try to hold him in your hand you'll surely get burned. Dylan's life of change and constant disappearances and constant transformations makes you yearn to hold him, and to nail him down. And that's why his fan base is so obsessive, so desirous of finding the truth and the absolutes and the answers to him — things that Dylan will never provide and will only frustrate. ... Dylan is difficult and mysterious and evasive and frustrating, and it only makes you identify with him all the more as he skirts identity."

"Slight, wiry, his blond, curly hair worn long, Bob Dylan never wears a tie and never lets anyone else make decisions for him. His unshakable independence courses through his songs—some of them wryly irreverent, others harshly critical of what he regards as hypocrisy and cruelty. His voice is acrid but curiously compelling, and he has become the most influential folksinger among today's teenagers—as well as among older dissenters. [...] Now 24, he is less the angry preacher of causes than he was two years ago. His songs have become more warmly personal and more deftly witty. He is cactus on the outside and romantic revolutionary within. He has no ideology except that of inner freedom. He is his own man."

"He had a lovely voice, but he was also, I think, a great poet. And he was the background music to a lot of people of my age. I don't take a lot of stock in generational thought, as you know. I think generational solidarity is the lowest form of solidarity there is. But I think that for every decade or so, every generational set, there is a special voice. And certainly for my lot, it was him."

"My hero was and still is Bob Dylan."

"I defy you to say what he'll be doing six months from now. He's just driven by pure art. You know, his son said to me..."There is no doubt that if my dad had never made it, if he was sitting on the side of the sidewalk with his guitar and a hat out in front of him, he would be doing precisely doing the same songs. His whole career would be exactly the same." Now, there is certainly hyperbole in that, but it's kind of, sort of true... If we have anybody who's Shakespeare in our time, it's Dylan, and he just speaks to me more and more, and he once said in an interview that the purpose of art was to inspire, and when you see a Dylan show...You would think he's so good, you know—if you go see a jazz cat who's so good playing bass, you can leave that show going, "Why even pick up a bass again?" But for some reason—and I'm not the only one that feels this—at the end of the Dylan show, art just seems so good. I want to go write a play, or write a novel. I'll stay up all night and write a song. And you don't care that it's not as good. The other thing that I love about Dylan is he is a freak, not a cheerleader... Dylan just stands there and says, "I am speaking for me. Maybe some of this is true for you to. I don't know. But I'm digging so deep." All of his mining, you know, is going towards his heart and deeper into his brain. He makes no attempt, that I can tell, to say, "Oh yeah, this is gonna kill 'em. This is what they'll like." And that's where universality has to live. You can't be universal if you're trying to please other people. You can only be universal if you have so clearly who you are, and Dylan has no idea who he is, but he's still searching and he's sharing that process with us."

"The conversation was flat. Suddenly, however, Dylan leapt to his feet and started berating me. He said, for example, something like, 'You'll never understand it; it happens so fast it'll go right past you,' and more of the same. I was startled, yes, but kept on trying to ask sensible, interesting questions; the attack persisted. I shrugged and left. The whole episode was entirely unprovoked... That evening, I went to the concert. My opinion then and now was that the music was unpleasant, the lyrics inflated, and Dylan a self-indulgent whining show-off."

"Musically, Dylan's not very gifted; he's borrowed his voice from old hillbillies. He's got a lot of borrowed things. He's not a great guitar player. He’s invented a character to deliver his songs ... it's a mask of sorts."

"He's one of the great artists of the century."

"I can still picture Bob Dylan, with just a bassist, a piano player, and his guitar, tenderly reworking "The Times They Are a-Changin'." When finished, he stepped off the stage, shook my hand, gave a little grin and bow in front of me and Michelle, and vanished without a word."

""The stage is the only place where I'm happy." But this has its own sadnesses, like so much love. He is the one person who has to be at a Dylan concert and the one person who can't go to a Dylan concert."

"A day doesn't go by when I don't listen to Dylan or at least think about him and his art. I just think we're terrifically lucky to be alive at a time when he is."

"Five years ago [Dylan] played a concert here at the university and I had no hand in arranging it; I was told about it rather late and could have killed the organizers. Shortly before the concert I received word to come backstage, so my wife and I went half an hour before the show. And Dylan said: "Mr Ricks, we meet at last." My reply was: "Have you read any good books lately?" [...] and he said: "Richard III". [...] Dylan wasn't at all surprised by my question and he really did want to talk about Richard III."

"Dylan creates a mythic atmosphere out of the land around us. The land we walk on every day and never see until someone shows it to us."

"Dylan has invented himself. He's made himself up from scratch. That is, from the things he had around him and inside him. Dylan is an invention of his own mind. The point isn't to figure him out but to take him in. He gets into you anyway, so why not just take him in? He's not the first one to have invented himself, but he's the first one to have invented Dylan..."

"Dylan was a revolutionary. Bob freed your mind the way Elvis freed your body. ... To this day, wherever great rock music is being made, there is the shadow of Bob Dylan."

"since I've been working in the theatre and listening over to some of his music and to his lyrics, I am getting quite a respect for him as a poet. I'm not happy about a lot of diffused, little cheating lines, second rate realism, that he sometimes offered. But in the same context, where the music is in a thriving rock culture, he's in that soft rock or whatever culture. Then he is a poet working within the same conditions that a Third World poet is working in because he is close to music and he's closer to the beat of the thing."

"Dylan's heart rests in his vocation. He is a white bluesman par excellence. His voice is born out of that vocation, informed by a vision rooted in reaching and teaching as many people as possible."

"Dylan is free now to work on his own terms. It would be foolish to predict what he will do next. But hopefully he will remain a mediator, using the language of pop to transcend it. If the gap between past and present continues to widen, such mediation may be crucial. In a communications crisis, the true prophets are the translators."

"I'll never be Bob Dylan. He's the master. If I'd like to be anyone, it's him. And he's a great writer, true to his music and done what he feels is the right thing to do for years and years and years. He's great. He's the one I look to. I'm always interested in what he's doing now, or did last, or did a long time ago that I didn't find out about. The guy has written some of the greatest poetry and put it to music in a way that it touched me, and other people have done that, but not so consistently or as intensely. Like me, he waits around and keeps going, and he knows that he doesn't have the muse all the time, but he knows that it'll come back and it'll visit him and he'll have his moment."

"There was a new popular music of protest. Pete Seeger had been singing protest songs since the forties, but now he came into his own, his audiences much larger. Bob Dylan and Joan Baez, singing not only protest songs, but songs reflecting the new abandon, the new culture, became popular idols. A middle-aged woman on the West Coast, Malvina Reynolds, wrote and sang songs that fit her socialist thinking and her libertarian spirit, as well as her critique of the modern commercial culture."

"You don't know someone's changing the world until the world's been changed."

"On a personal level, Freaking Out is a process whereby an individual casts off outmoded and restricting standards of thinking, dress, and social etiquette in order to express creatively his relationship to his immediate environment and the social structure as a whole."

"If your children ever find out how lame you really are, they’ll murder you in your sleep."

"Drop out of school before your mind rots from exposure to our mediocre educational system. Forget about the Senior Prom and go to the library and educate yourself if you've got any guts. Some of you like Pep rallies and plastic robots who tell you what to read. Forget I mentioned it. This song has no message. Rise for the flag salute."

"The things that were happening in 1955 were cosmic … in terms of music history."

"Scientology, how about that? You hold on to the tin cans and then this guy asks you a bunch of questions, and if you pay enough money you get to join the master race. How's that for a religion?"

"I consider that the building materials are exactly the same as what anybody else makes the thing out of. It's just the way they look at those materials is perhaps a narrower perspective. Time and those waves are at the disposal of anyone who wants to use them."

"Classical musicians go to the conservatories, rock´n roll musicians go to the garages."

"I think it's really tragic when people get serious about stuff. It's such an absurdity to take anything really seriously … I make an honest attempt not to take anything seriously: I worked that attitude out about the time I was eighteen, I mean, what does it all mean when you get right down to it, what's the story here? Being alive is so weird."

"I think that if a person doesn't feel cynical then they're out of phase with the 20th century. Being cynical is the only way to deal with modern civilization — you can't just swallow it whole."

"Being interviewed is one of the most abnormal things that you can do to somebody else. It's two steps removed from the Inquisition."

"I don't give a fuck if they remember me at all."

"Every socialistic type of government… produces bad art, produces social inertia, produces really unhappy people, and it's more repressive than any other kind of government."

"I'm probably more famous for sitting on the toilet than for anything else that I do."

"I'll tell you what classical music is, for those of you who don't know. Classical music is this music that was written by a bunch of dead people a long time ago. And it's formula music, the same as top forty music is formula music. In order to have a piece be classical, it has to conform to academic standards that were the current norms of that day and age … I think that people are entitled to be amused, and entertained. If they see deviations from this classical norm, it's probably good for their mental health."

"Their stupidity does not amaze me, its when they're smart that amazes me. It's baffling whenever you find someone who's smart — incredible. Soon you'll have zoos for such things."

"A wise man once said, "never discuss philosophy or politics in a disco environment.""

"When God created Republicans, he gave up on everything else."

"I like to watch the news, because I don't like people very much and when you watch the news... if you ever had an idea that people were really terrible, you could watch the news and know that you're right."

"The rock and roll business is pretty absurd, but the world of serious music is much worse."

"I have four children, and I want them to grow up in a country that has a working First Amendment."

"The most important thing to do in your life is to not interfere with somebody else's life."

"The first thing you have to do if you want to raise nice kids, is you have to talk to them like they are people instead of talking to them like they're property."

"Let's not be too rough on our own ignorance; it's what makes America great!"

"The essence of Christianity is told to us in the Garden of Eden history. The fruit that was forbidden was on the Tree of Knowledge. The subtext is, All the suffering you have is because you wanted to find out what was going on. You could be in the Garden of Eden if you had just kept your fucking mouth shut and hadn't asked any questions."

"The more boring a child is, the more the parents, when showing off the child, receive adulation for being good parents — because they have a tame child-creature in their house."

"Rock journalism is people who can't write, interviewing people who can't talk, in order to provide articles for people who can't read."

"Take the Kama Sutra. How many people died from the Kama Sutra, as opposed to the Bible? Who wins?"

"Tobacco is my favorite vegetable."

"My solos are speech-influenced rhythmically; and harmonically, they're either pentatonic, or poly-scale oriented. And there's the mixolydian mode that I also use a lot...But I'm more interested in melodic things I think the biggest challenge when you go to play a solo is trying to invent a melody on the spot."

"To me, absurdity is the only reality."

"Well I think that progress is not possible without deviation. And I think that it's important that people be aware of some of the creative ways in which some of their fellow men are deviating from the norm, because in some instances they might find these deviations inspiring and might suggest further deviations which might cause progress, you never know."

"It's time for a revolution, but probably not in the terms that people imagine it. The word seems to conjure up images of— sort of a modern day version of peasants going into the street with their pitch forks to go after the bad guy who lives in a big house someplace on a hill and we're gonna get that son-of-a-bitch and we'll take all the stuff away from him and we'll give it to the workers, you know. And that's not the kind of revolution I had in mind. ... Well, I thought that it might be nice if it was handled a little bit more modern and efficient way, without people getting slaughtered in the street. It's a matter of infiltration."

"So many books, so little time."

"So I'm watchin' and I'm waitin' Hopin' for the best Even think I'll go to prayin' Every time I hear 'em sayin' That there's no way to delay That trouble comin' every day No way to delay That trouble comin' every day"

"Hey, you know something people? I'm not black, But there's a whole lots a times I wish I could say I'm not white."

"And it's the same across the nation Black and white discrimination Yellin' "You can't understand me!" 'N all that other jazz they hand me In the papers and TV and All that mass stupidity That seems to grow more every day Each time you hear some nitwit say He wants to go and do you in Because the color of your skin Just don't appeal to him (No matter if it's black or white) Because he's out for blood tonight."

"I may be vile and pernicious But you can't look away I make you think I'm delicious With the stuff that I say I'm the best you can get Have you guessed me yet? I'm the slime oozin' out From your TV set."

"Watch out where the huskies go, and don't you eat that yellow snow."

"Look here brother, who you jivin' with that cosmik debris?"

"Jazz is not dead, it just smells funny."

"Frank Zappa: I would say the illusion [of freedom] will continue as long as it's profitable to continue the illusion. At the point where the illusion becomes too expensive to maintain they will just take down the scenery, they will pull back the curtains, they will move all the tables and chairs out of the way, and you will see the brick wall at the back of the theatre."

"You're an asshole! You're an asshole! That's right! You're an asshole! You're an asshole! Yes yes!"

"Information is not knowledge. Knowledge is not wisdom. Wisdom is not truth. Truth is not beauty. Beauty is not love. Love is not music. Music is the best…"

"You know, people are basically shitty. It’s when they prove it over and over again that it gets obnoxious."

"We live in a very special time right now. At no other time in history has there been such mass disillusionment in terms of reliance on governing functions. Most people don’t want to come to terms with that. It’s been proven over and over again that the emperor isn’t wearing any clothes, but most people don’t like to look at naked emperors. In the process of turning around to avert their eyes, they saw the discotheques and a few other things and latched onto them."

"There’s no reason to assume that my idea of what‘s better would really be better. I resent it when other people try to inflict their ideas of betterness on me. I don’t think they know. And I can’t see any authority on the horizon that’s got any answers that seem worthwhile. Most of the things that are suggested are probably detrimental to your mental health."

"Organized religions by their very natures are misleading. The bottom line is always money. What that’s got to do with your spiritual well-being still eludes me. It’s always the bucks, no matter how they disguise it. If you need that sort of assistance to keep yourself together, you may be paying a higher rate to a fake religion than you would to a psychotherapist. Which is not to say that a psychotherapist is going to give you any better value per dollar either. lf you’re going to deal with reality, you’re going to have to make one big discovery: Reality is something that belongs to you as an individual. If you wanna grow up, which most people don’t, the thing to do is take responsibility for your own reality and deal with it on your own terms. Don’t expect that because you pay some money to somebody else or take a pledge or join a club or run down the street or wear a special bunch of clothes or play a certain sport or even drink Perrier water, it’s going to take care of everything for you. Because it all comes from inside. As a matter of fact, that’s where it stays."

"Certification from one source or another seems to be the most important thing to people all over the world. A piece of paper from a school that says you’re smart, a pat on the head from your parents that says you’re good or some reinforcement from your peers that makes you think what you’re doing is worthwhile. People are just waiting around to get certified."

"The lifestyle that I have is probably neither desirable nor useful to most people. Most people are probably better off getting the certification they desire and spindling their lives away the way they’re doing. I don’t think they’d enjoy living any other way. There are millions of people who acquire all sorts of wonderful feelings from watching a football game and drinking a bottle of beer. It makes them really happy. Doesn’t do shit for me. But for them it’s life itself. As long as they can believe in the beer and the football, then they’ve really got something. And it’s probably more useful to them than religion. So why take it away? Why tell them what’s really going on? Let ’em be happy."

"If a person wants to write music and lyrics, he has a perfect right to express his views on a certain subject. I would feel wrong if I were to express anything that I didn’t believe in. I write what I like to write. Those who like to listen to it, listen to it. And the ones who don’t, watch football and drink beer, jog, go to discos and so forth. I never claimed to be a man for all seasons."

"Just because somebody hears something you say, or reads something that you write, doesn’t mean you’ve reached them. With reading comprehension being what it is in the U. S., you can safely toss that one out the window. If you want to judge by the listening habits of people who buy records, the first thing they do is put it on and talk over it."

"So much gets lost in the translation. Even if you sat there listening to it with a microscope, there’s no way you’re gonna find out what it means."

"People have preposterous ideas about what those songs are about and what the music means. They start spouting all this shit that’s so far off the mark, it’s revolting. But if that’s how they derive pleasure, who am I to deprive them of it? Let ’em enjoy it. It’s there for their edification. But total comprehension is out of the question."

"I can’t talk to you about music because you don’t know anything about music. I can talk to you about politics or sociology and all that peripheral stuff, but I can’t talk to you about music. There’s not enough information in common that I could say to you so you’d be able to understand. Besides, the people who read OUI don’t give a fuck about music anyway."

"The cool-person syndrome is peculiarly American. Part of that has to do with the way the educational business is run in the U.S. It’s not based on how much you can teach your child: it’s based on how much money the suppliers of basic materials can make off your child. Somewhere along the line most people pick up the desire to be a cool person, which is just another way to make them buy things. Once you’ve decided that you need to be a cool person, it makes you a possible victim of anyone whose products are the equivalent of bottled smoke. Somebody tells you to buy this particularly useless item and you’ll be a cool person. No matter how stupid it seems, you have to buy it. Pet Rocks. Pringle’s potato chips. whatever it is — the newest, the latest. Since the cool-person thing is something you learn in school, and since the school business is pretty suspicious and definitely tied up with the government, it makes you wonder whether or not the desire to be cool is part of a government plot to make you buy stupid things."

"The U.S. is a mere pup tent of a civilization. We’ve got two hundred years of stupidity behind us and we think we’re right up there with everyone else who’s been doing it for thousands of years."

"The richest people in the world aren’t particularly smart or happy. And the happiest people in the world aren’t particularly smart or rich.… That leaves me making music. But we can’t talk about that."

"Everything on this planet has something to do with music. Music functions in the realm of sculptured air. Polluted as our atmosphere might be, air is the thing that makes music work. Since all other things that occur in the sound domain are transmitted to the ear through that swirling mass, depending on how wide you want to make your definition, you could perceive quite a bit of human experience in terms of music."

"I think the music of the Fifties is really good. I suspect it’s much better musically than much of what’s available now. Not in terms of production, but in terms of content. One good believable song about some guy’s girlfriend and how they broke up — a sincere one — is better than twenty albums of English rock that’s ever been produced."

"Most people don’t think I’m rational. They’re too busy featuring their hurt. They find it irrational not to feature your hurt. That’s how fucked up they are."

"There isn’t anything weird about my music. Weird is a skeleton in the closet, wearing a rubber mask with warts all over its nose, and all that kind of shit. That’s not what I do. The thing that makes my music unusual is that people only hear one kind of music all the time over the radio. It’s wallpaper to their lives. Audile wallpaper. There’s one acceptable beat and there are three acceptable chord progressions. There are five acceptable words: baby, love, tears, yat yat. Just because I don’t deal in those terms doesn’t mean I’m weird. So tell these people: I ain’t weird; I’m rational. I’m a person who can choose to write stuff like that, or choose to write stuff that includes all the notes on the piano played at once, followed by a cement truck driving over the piano, followed by a small atomic explosion. Nothing weird about that as long as you do it in a meaningful way."

"Music is the only religion that delivers the goods. All music is good. It fulfills a social function. It's like wallpaper to your lifestyle. It defines what you are."

"I love the guitar, always have. I can relate to it a lot better than a saxophone."

"I don't do drugs, nor have I ever believed in them. Am I a creative person? Then why do people think in order to be creative one must do drugs? Actually, I think people take them as an excuse to screw up in public, y'know, spill things or get silly. Drugs have slowed down civilization because we have to wait for people to get off their high before we can resume. They are the millstone around society's neck."

"I have an important message to deliver to all the cute people all over the world. If you're out there and you're cute, maybe you're beautiful. I just want to tell you somethin' — there's more of us UGLY MOTHERFUCKERS than you are, hey-y, so watch out."

"Beauty is a pair of shoes that makes you wanna die."

"Whoever we are, wherever we're from We shoulda noticed by now, our behavior is dumb.And if our chances expect to improve. It's gonna take a lot more, than trying to remove the other race.Or the other whatever, from the face of the planet altogether."

"You can't run a country by a book of religion. Not by a heap or a lump or a smidgen. Of foolish rules of ancient date. Designed to make you all feel great. While you fold, spindle and mutilate.Those unbelievers from a neighboring state."

"TO ARMS! TO ARMS! Hooray! That's great! Two legs ain't bad unless there's a crate. They ship the parts to mama for souvenirs: two ears -- Get Down!"

"The Good Book says: "It's gotta be that way!" But their book says: "REVENGE THE CRUSADES!!!!... After all, he wrote this book here, and in the book it says he made us all to be just like him! So if we're dumb, then God is dumb — and maybe even a little ugly on the side."

"Remember there's a big difference between kneeling down and bending over."

"There are three things that smell of fish. One of them is fish. The other two are growing on you!"

"You say your life's a bum deal 'n yer up against the wall. Well, people, you ain't even got no deal at all. 'Cause what they do in Washington. They just takes care of Number One. An' Number One ain't you. You ain't even Number Two!"

"Shes a valley girl In a clothing store Okay, fine... Fer sure, fer sure."

"On Ventura, there she goes She just bought some bitch'n clothes Tosses her head n flips her hair She got a whole bunch of nothin in there"

"I think that if you use the so-called "strong words" you'll get your point across faster and you can save a lot of beating around the bush. Why are people afraid of words? Sometimes the dumbest thing that gets said makes the point for you."

"I'm a conservative, and you might not like that, but I am, and the fact of the matter is, this bill that they're talking about in Maryland is stupid."

"Do you think you are protecting somebody by taking away seven words?"

"Tell you what — Kiss my ass! How do you like that…?"

"Why should I smile when I'm sitting here with you?"

"The biggest threat to America today is not communism. It's moving America toward a fascist theocracy, and everything that's happened during the Reagan administration is steering us right down that pipe … I really think that. … When you have a government that prefers a certain moral code derived from a certain religion and that moral code turns into legislation to suit one certain religious point of view, and if that code happens to be very, very right wing, almost toward Attila the Hun..."

"I've smoked ten marijuana cigarettes in my life, and probably the last time I had one near my face was twelve, fifteen years ago. And the reason I did was because, since I do smoke, people would say, "Here, smoke this, you'll get high." So I smoked it, and it gave me a sore throat and made me sleepy. And I must either presume that that's what high means, or something was wrong. But I've never had a positive result from smoking marijuana. It just wasn't my cup of tea. And I never used LSD, never used cocaine, never used heroin or any of that other stuff."

"For the record, folks; I never took a shit on stage and the closest I ever came to eating shit anywhere was at a Holiday Inn buffet in Fayetteville, North Carolina, in 1973."

"The bassoon is one of my favorite instruments. It has the medieval aroma, like the days when everything used to sound like that. Some people crave baseball...I find this unfathomable, but I can easily understand why a person could get excited about playing the bassoon."

"A composer is a guy who goes around forcing his will on unsuspecting air molecules, often with the assistance of unsuspecting musicians."

"It isn't necessary to imagine the world ending in fire or ice — there are two other possibilities: one is paperwork, and the other is nostalgia."

"If you wind up with a boring, miserable life because you listened to your mom, your dad, your teacher, your priest, or some guy on TV telling you how to do your shit, then YOU DESERVE IT."

"Some scientists claim that hydrogen, because it is so plentiful, is the basic building block of the universe. I dispute that. I say there is more stupidity than hydrogen, and that is the basic building block of the universe."

"We're not talking light-hearted foolishness here — when we go for stupid we go for BIG STUPID — like people who shoot at you on the freeway, or the Rambos and Rambo-ettes who blow people away in shopping malls and fast-food restaurants with automatic weapons."

"My best advice to anyone who wants to raise a happy, mentally healthy child is: Keep him or her as far away from a church as you can. Children are naive — they trust everyone. School is bad enough, but, if you put a child anywhere in the vicinity of a church, you're asking for trouble."

"Gail has said in interviews that one of the things that makes our relationship work is the fact that we hardly ever get to talk to each other."

"The creation and destruction of harmonic and 'statistical' tensions is essential to the maintenance of compositional drama. Any composition (or improvisation) which remains consistent and 'regular' throughout is, for me, equivalent to watching a movie with only "good guys" in it, or eating cottage cheese."

"A drug is not bad. A drug is a chemical compound. The problem comes in when people who take drugs treat them like a license to behave like an asshole."

"The Ultimate Rule ought to be: 'If it sounds GOOD to you, it's bitchin'; if it sounds BAD to YOU, it's shitty. The more your musical experience, the easier it is to define for yourself what you like and what you don't like. American radio listeners, raised on a diet of _____ (fill in the blank), have experienced a musical universe so small they cannot begin to know what they like."

"There is no hell. There is only France."

"Art is making something out of nothing and selling it."

"There are more love songs than anything else. If songs could make you do something, we'd all love one another."

"The United States is a nation of laws: badly written and randomly enforced."

"Communism doesn't work because people like to own stuff."

"Fact of the matter is, there is no hip world, there is no straight world. There's a world, you see which has people in it who believe a variety of different things. Everybody believes in something and everybody, by virtue of the fact that they believe in something, use that something to support their own existence."

"The '60s was really stupid … It was a type of merchandising, Americans had this hideous weakness, they had this desire to be OK, fun guys and gals, and they haven't come to terms with the reality of the situation: we were not created equal. Some people can do carpentry, some people can do mathematics, some people are brain surgeons and some people are winos and that's the way it is, and we're not all the same. This concept of one world-ism, everything blended and smoothed out to this mediocre norm that everybody downgrades themselves to be is stupid. The '60s was merchandised to the public at large... My pet theory about the '60s is that there is a sinister plot behind it... The lessons learnt in the '60s about merchandising stupidity to the American public on a large scale have been used over and over again since that time."

"Politics is the entertainment division of the Military Industrial Complex."

"In the fight between you and the world, back the world."

"The Shaggs: better than The Beatles"

"People close to Zappa told me there was a good chance he could be diagnosed as manic-depressive if "they" ever got a chance to look at him. There was no way I could know if he'd have the patience to give me one minute or one hour. Expect anything, they said. Radical mood swing is the core of Zappa’s personality — and no doubt the core of his creativity as well. When I knocked on Frank’s door, he opened it with the slightest possible shred of acknowledgment. No handshake. I knew immediately where his mood swing was at the moment – several fathoms below sea level. That long black cloud was down and was there to stay for the duration of our first interview. His disdain for the ‘interrogation,’ as he called it, remained obvious. On our next encounter, the cloud disappeared and Zappa lightened up, rapping casually with fans who wandered in, and generally enjoying himself. Surprisingly, the results of both sessions were somehow consistent: Laced in with Zappa’s unrelenting cynicism, the hilarity was always there — regardless of what mood he was in. The only difference seemed to be whether or not he was laughing."

"We all have ability. The difference is how we use it."

"Sometimes I think I would love to see … just to see the beauty of flowers and trees and birds and the earth and grass. … Being as I've never seen, I don't know what it's like to see. So in a sense I'm complete. Maybe I'd be incomplete if I did see. Maybe I'd see some things that I didn't want to see … the beauty of the earth compared to the destruction of man. You see, it's one thing when you are blind from birth, and you don't know what it's like to see, anyway, so it is just like seeing. The sensation of seeing is not one that I have and not one that I worry about."

"Most cassettes are afraid of me."

"I've been a vegan for two years, so that's helped my already good-looking self. I think that eating healthy is important. … We have to be about making our planet more greener, the urban areas more sustainable for the children. We can't just talk about it, we have to be about it. … I'm motivating people to do something about how we are living on this planet. … You know it is only possible to be able to have the blessing of song through the fact that God has given me life. And the only way we can have life is by perpetuating life in how we live."

"What I’ve not heard is a unanimous commitment to atone for the sins of this country... I know that dance. I've heard those songs. It was an 18-year fight to (make) Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s birthday a national holiday... Yet it was a fight I was not willing to lose... Systemic racism can have an ending. Police brutality can have an ending. Economic repression of Black and brown people can have an ending... A movement without action is a movement standing still. To those who say they care: Move more than your mouth. Move your feet to the polls, and use your hands to vote... Black lives do matter. And this is not another digital, viral trend, moment or hashtag, Yes, all lives do matter, but they only matter when black lives matter too."

"Baby, everything is alright, Uptight, outta sight!"

"My Cherie Amour, pretty little one that I adore You're the only girl my heart beats for How I wish that you were mine."

"For once in my life I have someone who needs me, Someone I needed so long."

"For once in my life I won’t let sorrow hurt me, Not like it’s hurt me before, oh For once I have something I know won't desert me ‘Cause I’m not alone anymore."

"Like a fool I went and stayed too long, Now I'm wondering if your love's still strong, Ooh, baby, here I am, Signed, sealed, delivered, I'm yours!"

"But, very well, I believe I know you very well, Wish that you knew me too, very well, And I think I can deal with everything going through your head."

"When the summer came you were not around, Now the summer's gone and love cannot be found, Where were you when I needed you last winter, my love?"

"I'm happier than the morning sun, And that's the way you said that it would be, If I should ever bring you inside my life."

"You are the sunshine of my life, That's why I'll always be around, You are the apple of my eye, Forever you'll stay in my heart."

"I feel like this is the beginning, Though I've loved you for a million years, And if I thought our love was ending, I'd find myself drowning in my own tears."

"Very superstitious, Writings on the wall, Very superstitious, Ladder's 'bout to fall, Thirteen month old baby, Broke the looking glass, Seven years of bad luck, The good things in your past."

"When you believe in things that you don't understand, Then you suffer, Superstition ain't the way."

"I believe when I fall in love with you It will be forever."

"But what I'd like to know, Is could a place like this Exist so beautiful? Or do we have to find our wings and fly away To the visions in our mind?"

"A boy is born in hard time Mississippi, Surrounded by four walls that ain't so pretty, His parents give him love and affection, To keep him strong, moving in the right direction, Living just enough, just enough for the city."

"Her brother's smart, he's got more sense than many, His patience long, but soon he won't have any, To find a job is like a haystack needle, 'Cause where he lives, they don't use coloured people, Living just enough, just enough for the city."

"To see the heaven in your eyes is not so far, 'Cause I'm not afraid to try and go it, To know the love and beauty never known before, I'll leave it up to you to show it."

"I'm so darn glad he let me try it again, 'Cause my last time on earth I lived a whole world of sin, I'm so glad that I know more than I knew then, Gonna keep on trying until I reach my highest ground."

"But don't you worry 'bout a thing, Don't you worry 'bout a thing, mama, 'Cause I'll be standing in the side when you check it out."

"He's a man with a plan, Got a counterfeit dollar in his hand, He's misstra know-it-all."

"'Where is your God?' That's what my friends ask me, And I say it's taken him so long 'Cause we've got so far to come."

"And I can't go on this way, With it stronger every day, But being too shy to say That I really love you."

"I like to see you boogie right across the floor, I'd like to do it to you 'til you howl for more, I like to reggae, but you dance too fast for me, I'd like to make love to you so you can make me scream."

"'Cause we are sick and tired of hearing your song, Telling us how you are gonna change right from wrong, 'Cause if you really want to hear our views, You haven't done nothin'."

"No more lying friends wanting tragic ends, Though they do pretend, They won't go when I go."

"And I'll go where I've longed to go, So long, away from tears."

"Love's in need of love today, Don't delay, send yours in right away, Hate's going 'round breaking many hearts, Stop it please, before it's gone too far."

"Would you like to go with me Down my dead end street? Would you like to come with me To village ghetto land?"

"Music is a world within itself With a language we all understand, With an equal opportunity For all to sing, dance and clap their hands."

"Well there's Basie, Miller, Satchmo And the king of all, Sir Duke, And with a voice like Ella's ringing out, There's no way the band can lose."

"Looking back on when I was a little nappy-headed boy, Then my only worry was for Christmas, what would be my toy? Even though we sometimes would not get a thing, We were happy with the joy the day would bring."

"I wish those days could come back once more, Why did those days ever have to go?"

"They've been spending most their lives Living in a pastime paradise. They've been spending most their lives Living in a pastime paradise. They've been wasting most their time Glorifying days long gone behind, They've been wasting most their days In remembrance of ignorance oldest praise."

"As around the sun the earth knows she's revolving, And the rosebuds know to bloom in early May, Just as hate knows love's the cure, You can rest your mind assured, That I'll be loving you always."

"For you, there might be a brighter star, But through my eyes the light of you burns all I see. For you, there might be another song, But all my heart can hear is your melody."

"Goin' back to Saturn where the rings all glow, Rainbow, moonbeams and orange snow, On Saturn, people live to be two hundred and five, Goin' back to Saturn where the people smile, Don't need cars 'cause we've learned to fly, On Saturn, just to live to us is our natural high."

"You took me riding in your rocket and gave me a star, But at a half a mile from heaven You dropped me back down to this cold, cold world."

"Everyone's feeling pretty, It's hotter than july, Though the world's full of problems, They couldn't touch us even if they tried."

"Didn't know that you Would be jammin' until the break of dawn, See nobody ever told you that you Would be jammin' until the break of dawn."

"Well I'm a man of many wishes, Hope my premonition misses, But what I really feel, My eyes won't let me hide, 'Cause they always start to cry, 'Cause this time could mean goodbye."

"You know it doesn't make much sense, There ought to be a law against Anyone who takes offence At a day in your celebration, 'Cause we all know in our minds That there ought to be a time That we can set aside To show just how much we love you, And I'm sure you would agree, What could fit more perfectly Than to have a world party On the day you came to be? Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you, Happy birthday."

"I just called to say I love you, I just called to say how much I care, I just called to say I love you, And I mean it from the bottom of my heart."

"Call up, ring once, hang up the phone, To let me know you made it home, Don't want nothing to be wrong, With part-time lover."

"We are undercover passion on the run, Chasing love up against the sun, We are strangers by day, lovers by night, Knowing it's so wrong but feeling so right."

"And though you don't believe that they do, They do come true, For did my dreams Come true when I looked at you, And maybe too if you would believe, You too might be overjoyed, over love, over me."

"Raindrops, passionate raindrops, The kind of rain that writes 'They're so in love' on our skin. Raindrops, that we hope won't stop Cooling the red hot love that we are making."

"Shame on me, shame on you, Shame on them, shame on us, Shame on me, shame on you, Shame on them, shame on us, So what the fuss."

"I don't know what life would be like without music. In my lonely times, music has been my closest friend. It has also been my doctor-and my lover, in the sense that I sometimes listen to music and dream of a lover that doesn't exist. Late at night, when I don't feel sleepy, I'll play music-all types of music and lose myself in its mystery. I might decide to play Stevie Wonder, or Debussy, or Tchaikovsky. It depends on my mood."

"As Stevie Wonder says in his song (It will take a long time before white America can understand what his music is about at all; it's almost like a code. They don't really know what Stevie is singing about or what Stevie is saying. They can't afford to know.) Stevie says, "I ain't gotta do nothing to you; I ain't even gotta do nothing to you; you cause your own country to fall." And that's what's happening."

"Stevie Wonder delivered an emphatic, at times impatient video message Tuesday urging on the Black Lives Matter movement. Saying he has listened to "voices on the left, voices on the right," Wonder added, "What I’ve not heard is a unanimous commitment to atone for the sins of this country."... Wonder lamented that three states — North Dakota, South Dakota and Hawaii — have failed to formally recognize Juneteenth as a holiday. "... It was an 18-year fight to (make) Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s birthday a national holiday," said Wonder, who teamed with late U.S. Rep. John Conyers in that ultimately successful campaign... The short video, titled "The Universe is Watching Us," was posted to Wonder's social media channels Tuesday afternoon."

"And most of all, I'd like to thank Stevie Wonder, who didn't make an album this year."

"You shout in your sleep. Perhaps the price is just too steep. Is your conscience at rest if once put to the test? You awake with a start to just the beating of your heart. Just one man beneath the sky, Just two ears, just two eyes."

"You find your eyes are growing moist. All the fears never voiced say you have to make your final choice."

"Who are you and who am I To say we know the reason why Some are born, some men die, Beneath one infinite sky? There'll be war, there'll be peace, But everything one day will cease, All the iron turned to rust, All the proud men turned to dust, And so all things time will mend, So this song will end."

"Syd's story is a sad story romanticised by people who don't know anything about it. They've made it fashionable but it's just not that way."

"My technique is laughable at times. I have developed a style of my own, I suppose, which creeps around … I don't have to have too much technique for it. I've developed the parts of my technique that are useful to me. I'll never be a very fast guitar player. I don't really know what to say about my style. There's always a melodic intent in there."

"Roger doesn't have the right at present to tell me what to do with my life, although he believes that he does. And he'll not ruin my career, although lately he's been trying to."

"He had developed his own limited, or very simple style. He was never very keen on improving himself as a bass player and half the time I would play bass on the records because I would tend to do it quicker. Right back to those early records; I mean, at least half the bass on all recorded output is me anyway. … Rog used to come in and say, "Thank you very much" to me once in a while for winning him bass-playing polls."

"I've been in The Who, I've been in The Beatles and I've been in Pink Floyd! Top that!"

"Usually, in the studio, on this sort of thing ... you just go out and have a play over it, and see what comes, and it's usually — mostly — the first take that's the best one, and you find yourself repeating yourself thereafter."

"It's crazy that America gives such a paltry percentage of its GNP to the starving nations."

"The band? It's over. Reunited because of the good cause (Live 8), to get over the bad relationship, and not to have regrets."

"Where would rock and roll be without feedback?"

"Jimi Hendrix isn't as good as me!"

"Obviously, they're all a gang of idiots. But, you know... live and let live."

"I had a listen, I was intrigued … by this strange voice, and I went to her house, met her parents down in Kent, and she played me, it must have been forty or fifty songs, on tape, and I thought, I should try to do something. … We were making — Pink Floyd was making the Wish You Were Here album, and I think we had the record company people down at Abbey Road, in number 3, and I said to them "Do you want to hear something I've got? And they said "sure", so we found another room, and I played it to them, "The Man with the Child in His Eyes", and they said "Yep, thank you – we'll have it.""

"It is absolutely beautiful, isn't it? And its a sort of over two years before any of the other recordings she did. That is her singing at the age of 16, and having written those extraordinary lyrics — about whatever they're about."

"We want to spread this message of peace, and we want to raise the morale of the people who are defending their homeland there in Ukraine."

"Russia is not full of terrible people. It’s just that their leadership has gone so horribly wrong. ... A lot of the world is reacting in the right way. They are angry and they are frustrated. You can see and hear the frustration in the leaders of the other world’s countries. We can see it in the voice of your president, President Biden. He has let slip a couple of his feelings a couple of times over there. Other world leaders have done the same. And I think there’s a groundswell of opinion worldwide. This sort of thing shouldn’t be able to happen. It shouldn’t be able to be allowed. But we are in a world where still, here we are, a fifth of the way through the 21st century and still this obscene situation can happen. The mind boggles."

"In an era of showboating, Gilmour sounded like no one else: his playing was all about tone, texture and a kind of languid grandeur. The solos he pulled out for Pink Floyd’s Time, Money, Shine On You Crazy Diamond et al are, in a word, timeless."

"David Gilmour’s titanic playing on "Shine On You Crazy Diamond" has some of the most imitated feel and tone in history. Gilmour pays tribute to blues pioneers, particularly BB King, with his controlled feel and sublime behind-the-beat timing."

"David Gilmour laid down some of the tastiest solos of the decade. While Ritchie Blackmore set new standards for flash, Gilmour’s tasteful phrasing and sublime behind-the-beat feel showed the power of a few well-placed notes."

"His glorious fuzz tone, a silicon Fuzz Face boosted by a Colorsound Powerboost overdrive, is one of the most sought-after sounds in rock."

"The Man with the Child in His Eyes is still one of those things, which right from the get-go … has its own life, because it's just a great song. … For all the time that she or I or anyone spend decorating and creating moods, its actually the key element of what your saying, the melody and the chords which still speak louder than all the stuff around, on a great song."

"Creativity comes from the freedom to fail. And freedom to fail comes from experimentation, and that's what gives something its individuality. And, you know, I think her courage, which is the positive way of interpreting it, or bloody-mindedness, which is the negative, is part of what gives her real value as an artist."

"It's extraordinary what that song has been used for — I think a lot of people who have gotten into trouble, have attached themselves to that song, and I think a lot of it is Kate's wonderful voice is there, in a sort of reassuring and loving way, and it just makes them think that perhaps there is going to be that type of love out there for them."

"Climbing up on Solsbury Hill, I could see the city light. Wind was blowing, time stood still. Eagle flew out of the night. He was something to observe. Came in close, I heard a voice. Standing stretching every nerve, Had to listen had no choice. I did not believe the information. I just had to trust imagination. My heart going boom boom boom. "Son," he said, "Grab your things, I've come to take you home.""

"D.I.Y., D.I.Y., D.I.Y., D.I.Y. Don't tell me what I will do, 'cos I won't. Don't tell me to believe in you, 'cos I don't. Be on your guard, better hostile and hard, don't risk affection; Like flesh to the bone in the no-go zone, You're still looking for the Resurrection. Come up to me with your "What did you say?" And I'll tell you, straight in the eye: D.I.Y., D.I.Y."

"If looks could kill, they probably will In games without frontiers — war without tears."

"Jeux sans frontieres"

"Dressing up in costumes, playing silly games Hiding out in tree-tops shouting out rude names — whistling tunes we hide in the dunes by the seaside — whistling tunes we piss on the goons in the jungle. It’s a knockout."

"You can blow out a candle But you can't blow out a fire Once the flames begin to catch The wind will blow it higher"

"Oh Biko, Biko, because Biko Yihla Moja, Yihla Moja — The man is dead."

"And the eyes of the world are watching now."

"The time I like is the rush hour, cos I like the rush The pushing of the people — I like it all so much Such a mass of motion — do not know where it goes I move with the movement and... I have the touch."

"I'm waiting for ignition, I'm looking for a spark Any chance collision and I light up in the dark There you stand before me, all that fur and all that hair Oh, do I dare... I have the touch."

"Shock the monkey to life."

"Fox the fox Rat on the rat You can ape the ape I know about that There is one thing you must be sure of I can't take any more Darling, don't you monkey with the monkey."

"Cover me, when I sleep Cover me, when I breathe You throw your pearls before the swine Make the monkey blind Cover me, darling please. Monkey, monkey, monkey. Don't you know you're going to shock the monkey?"

"Red rain is coming down. Red rain. Red rain is pouring down, Pouring down all over me."

"I am standing up at the water's edge in my dream I cannot make a single sound as you scream. It can't be that cold, the ground is still warm to touch. This place is so quiet, sensing that storm."

"Red rain- Putting the pressure on much harder now To return again and again. Just let the red rain splash you, Let the rain fall on your skin. I come to you defenses down, With the trust of a child."

"You could have a steam train If you'd just lay down your tracks. You could have an aeroplane flying If you bring your blue sky back.All you do is call me. I'll be anything you need."

"In this proud land we grew up strong; We were wanted all along. I was taught to fight, taught to win; I never thought I could fail.No fight left or so it seems; I am a man whose dreams have all deserted. I've changed my face, I've changed my name, But no one wants you when you lose."

"Don't give up 'cos you have friends Don't give up You're not beaten yet. Don't give up I know you can make it good..."

"Rest your head. You worry too much. It's going to be alright. When times get rough, You can fall back on us. Don't give up; Please don't give up."

"Don't give up. You know it's never been easy. Don't give up. 'Cause I believe there's a place, There's a place where we belong."

"I’m hearing right and wrong so clearly. There must be more than this. It’s only in uncertainty That we’re naked and alive."

"What I carry in my heart Brings us so close or so far apart. Only love can make love."

"Love I get so lost, sometimes. Days pass and this emptiness fills my heart. When I want to run away, I drive off in my car. But whichever way I go, I come back to the place you are."

"All my instincts, they return. And the grand façade, so soon will burn. Without a noise, without my pride I reach out from the inside."

"In your eyes, The light, the heat. In your eyes, I am complete. In your eyes, I see the doorway to a thousand churches. In your eyes, The resolution of all the fruitless searches.In your eyes, I see the light and the heat. In your eyes, Oh, I want to be that complete. I want to touch the light, the heat I see in your eyes."

"I get so tired of working so hard for our survival I look to the time with you to keep me awake and alive."

"Looking down on empty streets, all she can see Are the dreams all made solid Are the dreams all made real."

"All of the buildings, all of those cars Were once just a dream In somebody's head."

"The place where I come from is a small town. They think so small; They use small words -But not me. I'm smarter than that. I worked it out. I've been stretching my mouth To let those big words come right out."

"We do what we're told, Told to do."

"Souma Yergon, Sou Nou Yergon, We are shakin' the tree. Souma Yergon, Sou Nou Yergon, We are shakin' the tree."

"Waiting your time, dreaming of a better life. Waiting your time, you're more than just a wife. You don't want to do what your mother has done, She has done. This is your life, this new life has begun. It's your day - a woman's day. It's your day - a woman's day."

"Turning the tide, you are on the incoming wave. Turning the tide, you know you are nobody's slave."

"There's nothing to gain when there's nothing to be lost. There's nothing to gain if you stay behind and count the cost. Make the decision that you can be who you can be, You can be. Tasting the fruit come to the Liberty Tree."

"Changing your ways, changing those surrounding you. Changing your ways, more than any man can do. Open your heart, show him the anger and pain, so you heal. Maybe he's looking for his womanly side, let him feel."

"The wretched desert takes its form, the jackal proud and tight. In search of you, I feel my way, through the slowest heaving night. Whatever fear invents, I swear it makes no sense. I reach through the border fence. Come down, come talk to me."

"And in this moment, I need to be needed. With this darkness all around me, I like to be liked. In this emptiness and fear, I want to be wanted. 'Cause I love to be loved. I love to be loved. I love to be loved. Yes, I love to be loved."

"This old familiar craving. I've been here before, this way of behaving. Don't know who the hell I'm saving anymore. Let it pass, let it go, let it leave. From the deepest place I grieve. This time I believe And I let go..."

"I caught sight of my reflection; I caught it in the window. I saw the darkness in my heart; I saw the signs of my undoing. They had been there from the start, And the darkness still has work to do. The knotted chord's untying. They're heated and they're holy. Oh they're sitting there on high. So secure with everything they're buying."

"In the blood of Eden, Lie the woman and the man. With the man in the woman, And the woman in the man."

"Give me steam. And how you feel to make it real; Real as anything you've seen. Get a life with this dreamer's dream."

"Don't talk back; Just drive the car. Shut your mouth; I know what you are. Don't say nothing; Keep your hands on the wheel. Don't turn around; This is for real. Digging in the dirt. Stay with me, I need support. I'm digging in the dirt To find the places I got hurt. Open up the places I got hurt."

"From the pain come the dream. From the dream come the vision. From the vision come the people. From the people come the power. From this power come the change."

"So what's one little kiss, one tiny little touch? Aah, he's wanting it so much. I swear that this is royal blood, running through my skin. Oh, can you see the state I'm in? Kiss it better, kiss it better."

"Don't you know that I'm not joking? Aah, you think you won't, I think you will. Don't you know that this tongue can kill? C'mon, c'mon, c'mon, c'mon, c'mon, c'mon. Lady kiss that frog."

"I grieve for you You leave me So hard to move on Still loving what's gone They say life carries on Carries on and on and on and on..."

"Life carries on In the people I meet In everyone that’s out on the street In all the dogs and cats In the flies and rats In the rot and the rust In the ashes and the dust Life carries on and on and on and on."

"Did I dream this belief or did I believe this dream how I will find relief I grieve..."

"In the big house, Where the sun lives, With the walls so white and blue. In the red soil, All the green grows. And the winds blow across your face. They blow across your heart. It's the time of the turning and there's something stirring outside. It's the time of turning and we'd better learn to say our goodbyes."

"It's the time of turning and there's something stirring outside. It's the time of turning and the old world's falling. Nothing you can do can stop by the next emerging. Time of the turning and we'd better learn to say our goodbyes."

"If we can stand up When all else falls down, We'll last through the winter. We'll last through the storms. We'll last through the north winds That bring down the ice and snow. We'll last through the long nights Till the green field's growing again. Growing again."

"I'm scared of swimming in the sea, Dark shapes moving under me. Every fear I swallow makes me small. Inconsequential things occur, Alarms are triggered, Memories stir. It's not the way it has to be."

"Now we're busy making all our busy plans On foundations built to last. But nothing fades as fast as the future And nothing clings like the past, until we can see.More than this, More than this. So much more than this. There is something out there More than this. It's coming through And more than this. I stand alone and so connected And I'm all there, Right next to you."

"No. I know that's blasphemous when you are from Detroit."

"It is the pursuit of happiness that brings us happiness, and not the happiness achieved."

"It seemed like there was no control over it. I think certain things just popped. God was blessing us in telling us that certain things were going the way they were supposed to go."

"I'm always surprised when anything about the band connects. But I love the fact that it's hard for people to understand. We've said before that it's always been a great thing to get certain people to go away thinking, 'Oh dear, she can't play the drums!' 'Fine, if you think it's all a gimmick, go away!' It weeds out people who wouldn't care anyway."

"Frank Sinatra was dignified. We don't have a Frank Sinatra, or a Patti Page nowadays. What do we have? Ashlee Simpson instead of Patti Page! I mean, look at those people - like Paris Hilton! Who are all these skanks, man? Little girls are looking up to these girls, and it's so gross. Those girls have no dignity at all, and parents are letting their kids dress up like those skanks. But what else have they got? What are the other choices? Somebody had the nerve to ask me if I wanted to play guitar on Lindsay Lohan's album! She's another one of those 16-year-old actresses, and she's making an album! Like, 'NO!' Ha ha ha!"

"I feel it, you felt it—we're all struggling with the trouble that this industry is in right now. And it's not about sales; it's about beauty and romance and a relationship to art that's turning invisible, and it's affecting people's perception of music. It's affecting whether they think of it as a viable art, because it's so fucking disposable. It's not about being modern or retro or a Luddite or being hopeful or pessimistic about the future; it's about clinging on to what makes sense of our lives, and what give our lives value, and what gives us a commonality and a feeling of belonging."

"I love him (Josh Homme) too much, and you can't hurt someone that you love that much ... unless you're family."

"I have three dads: my biological father, God and Bob Dylan."

"Every time there's a list of the 100 greatest records of all time, all those albums were recorded in two days. Hardly any of them took a year, I'll tell you. In this day and age, I think it's important that people know that."

"At times, we [the White Stripes] almost ignore our own music. If we have the stage, we've gotta play Son House's music, because there's nobody to keep it alive. We don't wanna be known as the band that's conducting music instruction class. But that's all everyone talks about - why MTV's not good, why radio's not good. And the answer is really because whatever you want to call it - blues, country, folk - isn't around any more. That's why everyone's so mad, and I'm tired of it being my job to bring it back."

"'I'm excited by the band [White Stripes]. It really excites me. But it wouldn't excite me if there weren't those limitations, if we weren't living in that box, if we weren't trapped. Once that goes away, then I'll know that it's not worth doing it any more.'"

"Is this some kind of fucking radio promotion? What the fuck is this? Let me just say that if whatever said radio station tries to blacklist us for my comments about their balloons, I would like them to know I want a written apology tomorrow for interrupting my song."

"You can't do better than that."

"Well that's a polite thing to say but that's fucking ridiculous."

"I tend to be that guy, you know? When me and four friends walk into a restaurant and nobody else talks to the host, I say, “Yeah, it’s a table for five.” I don’t want to be that guy; I wish someone else would say something. But it always ends up being me, and I hate what comes with that. There’s a lot of baggage—ego and narcissism—that comes with leadership. It’s difficult to cope with at times."

"It'll sometimes hit me in the middle of a song, like, who do I think I am standing up here...playing."

"I saw a review of our new album, and it said, "Every single component of the White Stripes is a gigantic lie." What does that mean? Have I sat down and said I was born in Mississippi? No. Did I say I grew up on a plantation and learned how to play guitar from a blind man? I never said anything like that. It's funny that people think me and Meg sit up late at night, in front of a gas lamp, and come up with these intricate lies to trick people."

"I'm not saying I came up with anything [laughs]. It's like people thinking we would be more real if we went onstage in jeans and T-shirts. How ignorant is that, to think that because they don't wear a suit onstage that someone is giving you the real deal? People do come and see us and think, "Look at all these gimmicks." Go ahead, man. Go ahead and think that."

"I see him becoming one of the greatest record producers there is."

"Jack is the showman—the brassy frontman and the snake-oil trader."

"I would love to be Jack White — or maybe I want the peo­ple who like Jack White to also like me. But I”m the guy who writes beau­ti­ful music at 85 beat per minute."

"I wasn’t prepared. He had a big Mercedes, with a custom sound system, and he drove like hell through Nashville traffic, with Slim Harpo at defcon 1 volume."

"It seems as if I am making a comeback but I have never really been away. It’s very strange because the whole attitude changes and everything is turned inside out. Now I am seeing the shiny side again."

"Art was what I originally started out to do and music came second at first. I had a year at art college but I left because it was too much like school. I give all my paintings away to people I like."

"Geoffrey Robertson: You don't think that this man deserves to die? Yusuf Islam: Who, Salman Rushdie? Robertson: Yes. Islam: Yes, yes. Robertson: And do you have a duty to be his executioner? Islam: Uh, no, not necessarily, unless we were in an Islamic state and I was ordered by a judge or by the authority to carry out such an act — perhaps, yes."

"Rather than go to a demonstration to burn an effigy of the author Salman Rushdie, I would have hoped that it'd be the real thing."

"If Rushdie turned up at my doorstep looking for help, I might ring somebody who might do more damage to him than he would like. I'd try to phone the Ayatollah Khomeini and tell him exactly where this man is."

"In Islam there is a line between let's say freedom and the line which is then transgressed into immorality and irresponsibility and I think as far as this writer is concerned, unfortunately, he has been irresponsible with his freedom of speech. Salman Rushdie or indeed any writer who abuses the prophet, or indeed any prophet, under Islamic law, the sentence for that is actually death. It's got to be seen as a deterrent, so that other people should not commit the same mistake again."

"I'm very sad that this seems to be the No. 1 question people want to discuss. I had nothing to do with the issue other than what the media created. I was innocently drawn into the whole controversy. So, after many years, I'm glad at least now that I have been given the opportunity to explain to the public and fans my side of the story in my own words. At a lecture, back in 1989, I was asked a question about blasphemy according to Islamic Law, I simply repeated the legal view according to my limited knowledge of the Scriptural texts, based directly on historical commentaries of the Qur'an. The next day the newspaper headlines read, "Cat Says, Kill Rushdie." I was abhorred, but what could I do? I was a new Muslim. If you ask a Bible student to quote the legal punishment of a person who commits blasphemy in the Bible, he would be dishonest if he didn't mention Leviticus 24:16."

"I wish to express my heartfelt horror at the indiscriminate terrorist attacks committed against innocent people of the United States yesterday. While it is still not clear who carried out the attacks, it must be stated that no right thinking follower of Islam could possibly condone such an action: the Qur'an equates the murder of one innocent person with the murder of the whole of humanity. We pray for the families of all those who lost their lives in this unthinkable act of violence as well as all those injured; I hope to reflect the feelings of all Muslims and people around the world whose sympathies go out to the victims at this sorrowful moment."

"We understand the anger, the anguish and suffering which this act of international terrorism has created amongst people. What we are worried about is the impact of the wrong kind of response to it. … We believe that the civilised world is a multicultural, multi-religious world. That is the type of message we want to get across. … I think there are many who are Muslims and non-Muslims, who are not warmongers but peace makers and want this world to be a better place. We believed the unison of the voices of so many people standing together against international terrorism is something to be valued and something to be built upon."

"I wanted a break. I had been on the road more or less since I was 18, you know? And I hadn't known any other life, other than, you know, hotel rooms and concerts and records and studios and press conferences. … and to me, here was a chance to jump off that kind of wagon and see life for real. You know, actually my last album was called Back to Earth. So that was the meaning of it. I wanted to join the human race again. I didn't want to be a star. I didn't want to continue with that thing, because so much illusion and non-reality is connected to it. I wanted to be real. And so I — I kind of — I found an opportunity. And the actual point about music was — the imam who I met and who I first embraced Islam with in London's Central Mosque, he actually told me to continue making records."

"It seems to be the easiest thing in the world these days to make scurrilous accusations against Muslims, and in my case it directly impacts on my relief work and damages my reputation as an artist. The harm done is often difficult to repair."

"The last place I wanted to return to was the music business. But it's the people and the cause that matter and right now there's an important need, which is bridge-building. I wanted to support the cause of humanity, because that's what I always sang about. Music can be healing, and with my history and my knowledge of both sides of what looks like a gigantic divide in the world, I feel I can point a way forward to our common humanity again. It's a big step for me but it's a natural step. I don't feel at all irked by the responsibility — I feel inspired."

"I wrote a song called "Father & Son" about the son running off to do his own thing. Now the story is about my son coming back and bringing a guitar into the house. A couple of years ago, one morning after prayers, his guitar was lying around. I picked it up and my fingers knew exactly where to go. I'd written some words and when I put them to music, it moved me and I realized I could have another job to do. Things just grew from there."

"I had to learn my faith and look after my family, and I had to make priorities. But now I've done it all and there's a little space for me to fill in the universe of music again."

"A lot of people would have loved me to keep singing … You come to a point where you have sung, more or less … your whole repertoire and you want to get down to the job of living. You know, up until that point, I hadn't had a life. I'd been searching, been on the road."

"I was a sitting target, in a way, for anybody who wanted to make some kind of headline. … I certainly never supported the Fatwa, but when I was asked about … the actual principle of blasphemy and capital punishment, well, like the Bible, I said, "You know, yeah, it's there, it's in the Koran." And I couldn't deny that."

"A big turning point happened when my son brought back a guitar into the house — You know, 'cause I'd given all those guitars away to charity — way back in 1979 and hadn't really touched the instrument, you know, for like two decades. … So then one day … when everybody's asleep and nobody's watching, I pick it up — and lo and behold, I still know where to put my fingers and out comes this music. I said, "Maybe I've got another job to do." And in this time and period it's probably the best thing I can do because lecturing, politics, God, I've got nothing to do with that. I want to just get heart-to-heart, make sure people understand some of the real subtle beauties of what I've discovered."

"Here's a chance, I think, for us to kind of remind ourselves, of those things we all commonly enjoy and love and share, try to get back together. You know, singing out for a more peaceful world today, I think, can only do good. … I do believe that … a lot of Muslims have yet to learn, you know, the incredible great history and contribution of Islamic civilization — and its become very, if you like, in some way puritanical — that puritanical approach will become narrower and narrower and even become more fragmented. Its that vast middle ground where people actually live, you know, that we have to reclaim; and in that area, everybody should be able to live together. And I don't think that God sent us prophets and books to fight about these books and these prophets. But they were telling us, actually, how to live together. If we ignore those teachings — whichever faith you belong, you profess, then I think we'll be finding ourselves in an even deeper mess."

"I never called for the death of Salman Rushdie; nor backed the Fatwa issued by the Ayatollah Khomeini — and still don’t. The book itself destroyed the harmony between peoples and created an unnecessary international crisis. When asked about my opinion regarding blasphemy, I could not tell a lie and confirmed that — like both the Torah and the Gospel — the Qur’an considers it, without repentance, as a capital offense. The Bible is full of similar harsh laws if you’re looking for them. However, the application of such Biblical and Qur’anic injunctions is not to be outside of due process of law, in a place or land where such law is accepted and applied by the society as a whole."

"In 1989, during the heat and height of the Satanic Verses controversy, I was silly enough to accept appearing on a program called Hypotheticals which posed imaginary scenarios by a well-versed (what if…?) barrister, Geoffrey Robertson QC. I foolishly made light of certain provocative questions. When asked what I’d do if Salman Rushdie entered a restaurant in which I was eating, I said, “I would probably call up Ayatollah Khomeini”; and, rather than go to a demonstration to burn an effigy of the author, I jokingly said I would have preferred that it'd be the “real thing”. Criticize me for my bad taste, in hindsight, I agree. But these comments were part of a well-known British national trait; a touch of dry humor on my part. Just watch British comedy programs like "Have I Got News For You" or “Extras”, they are full of occasionally grotesque and sardonic jokes if you want them! … Certainly I regret giving those sorts of responses now. However, it must be noted that the final edit of the program was made to look extremely serious; hardly any laughs were left in and much common sense was savagely cut out. Most of the Muslim participants in the program wrote in and complained about the narrow and selective use of their comments, surreptitiously selected out of the 3-hour long recording of the debate. But the edit was not in our hands. Balanced arguments were cut out and the most sensational quotes, preserved."

""Peace Train" is a song I wrote, the message of which continues to breeze thunderously through the hearts of millions. There is a powerful need for people to feel that gust of hope rise up again. As a member of humanity and as a Muslim, this is my contribution to the call for a peaceful solution."

"Life is a journey, you know; and a lot of journeys, you go out, you come back."

"I love my dog as much as I love you But you may fade, my dog will always come through."

"The first cut is the deepest, Baby I know — The first cut is the deepest 'Cause when it comes to being lucky, she's cursed When it comes to lovin' me, she's worst But when it comes to being loved, she's first That's how I know The first cut is the deepest."

"My Lady D'Arbanville, why do you sleep so still? I'll wake you tomorrow, and you will be my fill, Yes, you will be my fill"

"Will you make us laugh, will you make us cry? Will you tell us when to live; will you tell us when to die? I know we've come a long way, We're changing day to day, But tell me, where do the children play?"

"I’m looking for a hard-headed woman, One who will make me do my best, And if I find my hard-headed woman, I know the rest of my life will be blessed"

"I know many fine feathered friends But their friendliness depends on how you do They know many sure fired ways, To find out the one who pays And how you do"

"Now that I've lost everything to you You say you wanna start something new And it's breakin' my heart you're leaving Baby, I'm grieving"

"Baby, I love you But if you wanna leave, take good care I hope you make a lot of nice friends out there But just remember there's a lot of bad and beware Oh, baby, baby, it's a wild world It's hard to get by just upon a smile Oh, baby, baby, it's a wild world I'll always remember you like a child"

"Lord, my body has been a good friend But I won't need it when I reach the end Miles from nowhere, Guess I'll take my time Oh yeah, to reach there"

"I love everything So don't it make you feel sad 'cause I'll drink to you, my baby I'll think to that, I'll think to that"

"I don’t want to work away Doing just what they all say"

"Longer boats are coming to win us Hold on to the shore, or — They’ll be taking the key from the door"

"I built my house from barley rice Green pepper walls and water ice – And everything emptying into White"

"So on and on I go, the seconds tick the time out There’s so much left to know, and I’m on the road to find out."

"Then I found my head one day when I wasn’t even trying And here I have to say, ‘cause there is no use in lying, lying Yes the answer lies within, so why not take a look now? Kick out the devil’s sin, pick up, pick up a good book now."

"It’s not time to make a change, Just relax, take it easy You’re still young, that’s your fault, There’s so much you have to know. Find a girl, settle down, If you want you can marry Look at me, I am old, but I’m happy"

"But take your time, think a lot, Why, think of everything you’ve got For you will still be here tomorrow, but your dreams may not"

"It’s always been the same, same old story. From the moment I could talk I was ordered to listen Now there’s a way and I know that I have to go — away"

"All the times that I’ve cried, keeping all the things I knew inside, It’s hard, but it’s harder to ignore it"

"Bring tea for the Tillerman, Steak for the sun, Wine for the women who made the rain come, Seagulls sing your hearts away ‘Cause while the sinners sin, the children play"

"I listen to the wind To the wind of my soul Where I’ll end up well I think, Only God really knows"

"Ruby my love, You’ll be my love"

"If I laugh just a little bit Maybe I can forget the chance That I didn’t have to know you And live in peace, in peace"

"Don't you feel a change a coming From another side of time, Breaking down the walls of silence, Lifting shadows from your mind."

"How can I tell you that I love you, I love you But I can’t think of right words to say."

"If I make a mark in time, I can’t say the mark is mine I’m only the underline of the word Yes, I’m like him; just like you, I can’t tell you what to do Like everybody else I’m searching through What I’ve heard"

"And if I ever lose my hands, Lose my power, lose my land. Oh, if I ever lose my hands, Ooh, I won't have to work no more.And if I ever lose my eyes, If my colors all run dry. Yes, if I ever lose my eyes, Ooh, I won't have to cry no more.Yes, I'm bein' followed by a moon shadow, Moon shadow, moon shadow. Leapin' and hoppin' on a moon shadow, Moon shadow, moon shadow."

"Now I've been happy lately Thinking about the good things to come And I believe it could be Something good has begun. Oh, I've been smiling lately Dreaming about the world as one And I believe it could be Someday it's going to come."

"Now I've been crying lately, Thinking about the world as it is. Why must we go on hating? Why can't we live in bliss?"

"Now come and join the living, its not so far from you And its getting nearer, soon it will all be true Oh peace train sounding louder"

"Oh I’m on my way, I know I am, Somewhere not so far from here All I know is all I feel right now, I feel the power growing in my hair Sitting on my own not by myself, Everybody’s here with me I don’t need to touch your face to know, And I don’t need to use my eyes to see"

"Oh I’m on my way I know I am, But times there were when I thought not Bleeding half my soul in bad company, I thank the moon I had the strength to stop"

"Now I’m not making love to anyone’s wishes, Only for that light I see ‘Cause when I’m dead and lowered low in my grave, That’s gonna be the only thing that’s left of me"

"As years went by the boy grew high And the village looked on in awe They’d never seen anything like The boy with the moon and star before And people would ride from far and wide just to seek the word he spread "I'll tell you everything I've learned," And "Love", is all he said."

"She moves like and angel And seven evening stars Dance through the window Of her universal house"

"Her breath a warm fire In every lovers heart A mistress to magicians And a dancer to the gods"

"Her clothes are made of rainbows And twenty thousand tears Shine through the spaces Of her golden ochre hair"

"Sing a song of love and truth We’ll soon remember if you do When all things were tall And our friends were small And the world was new"

"Oh I can’t keep it in; I can’t keep it in, I’ve gotta let it out I’ve got to show the world; world’s got to see, See all the love; love that’s in me"

"Well I rode a while, for a mile or so Down the road to the 18th Avenue And the people I saw were the people I know And they all came down to take a view"

"O caritas, O caritas nobis semper sit amor mos perituri mortem salutamus — ah, ah sola resurgit vita"

"Give me time forever here in my time"

"Underneath her kiss I was so unguarded Every bottle’s empty now and all those dreams are gone Ah, but the song carries on … so holy"

"All those days are frozen now and all those scars are gone Ah, but the song carries on … so holy"

"Where’s it leading to, freedom at what cost? People needing more and more and it’s all getting lost"

"Yesterday I was on the edge Hoping everything was going to work itself out A good honest man doing the work of God Trying to make things better for Him A lover of life in a school for fools Trying to find another way to survive"

"I said, ‘Put back your heart, and sing, sing While you know you’re still living.’ Sing, sing, sing, while you know there’s still – New Music, new Music, new Music Sweet Music can lighten us Can brighten the world – can save us"

"Oh very young, What will you leave us this time? There’ll never be a better chance to change your mind. And if you want this world to see better days, Will you carry the words of love with you? Will you ride the great white bird into heaven? And though you want them to last forever, You know they never will — you know they never will. And the goodbye makes the journey harder still."

"Sun is the reason And the world it will bloom ‘Cause sun lights the sky And the sun lights the moon"

"They crossed the wood and hanged him A long time ago They still misunderstand him Those who don’t know And in the evening his love will lead the blind In every secret corner there in your mind"

"I love, I love, I’m ready to love — yes"

"And if my mind breaks up In all so many ways I know the meaning of The words, “I love you”"

"I’ve, I’ve had it enough All those lonely rooms And blank faces Had it enough And I want you, I want you no more"

"Come the morning I’ll be far from here Slowly rising in another sphere"

"Dark and empty was the place to which I’d come Cold and silent was the house my name was on Nine rooms — and a tomb in every one"

"Novim's Nightmare"

"This stranger had the key To any door he wished — with his eyes, I say What kind of majiks, of majiks? What kind of man — Can make me turn and see the way I really am?"

"One is the ever kindling star King of the immortal spark In heaven’s eye"

"Don’t you remember the days Of the old schoolyard When we had imaginings and we had All kinds of things and we laughed And needed love … yes, I do Oh and I remember you"

"I never wanted to be a star, I never wanted to travel far I only wanted a little bit of love So I could put a little love in my heart"

"Well, if you want to sing out, sing out, And if you want to be free, be free. 'Cause there's a million things to be, You know that there are."

"Morning has broken, Like the first morning, Blackbird has spoken Like the first bird. Praise for the singing! Praise for the morning! Praise for them springing Fresh from the Word!"

"Then, in 1978, he turned his back on it all, embraced Islam and changed his name. For many of his long time fans, it was a baffling decision - why would a man who appeared to have it all throw it all away? Now, in a major interview for Radio 2, Yusuf Islam charts the long journey from pop stardom to religious enlightenment and reveals the reasons behind his decision."

"Yes, Martha Stewart is going to jail and Cat Stevens is being deported. Man, I feel so much safer now."

"A flight from London carrying the artist we all used to know as Cat Stevens, now known as Yusuf Islam, was forced to make an emergency landing in Bangor, Maine after his name showed up on a terrorist no-fly list. I tell you, it's a real success story in the war on terror. You know, we finally got the guy that wrote "Peace Train.""

"For many years, Yusuf Islam has been pretending he didn’t say the things he said in 1989, when he enthusiastically supported the Iranian terrorist edict against me and others. However, his words are on the record, in print interviews and on television programs.… I’m afraid Cat Stevens got off the peace train a long time ago."

"I've had enough of breakdowns and diagrams— Judging from picture books, apparently Heaven is a partly cloudy place."

"I used to think, if I could realise I'd die Then I would be a lot nicer Used to believe in a lot more Now I just see straight ahead That's not to say I don't have good times But as for my days, I spend them waiting..."

"When you jump up the Earth wants you back."

"I do this thing where I think I'm real sick but I won't go to the doctor to find out about it cause they make you stay real still in a real small space as they chart up your insides and put them on display. They'd see all of it, all of me, all of it; All the good that won't come out of me..."

"It's all of the good that won't come out of us and how eventually our hands will just turn to dust, if we keep shaking them standing here on this frozen lake."

"Then you hang up the phone and feel badly for upsetting things And crawl back into bed to dream of a time When your heart was open wide and you love things just because Like the sick and dying"

"And sometimes when you're on You're really fucking on And your friends they sing along And they love you But the lows are so extreme That the good seems fucking cheap And it teases you for weeks in its absence"

"There's blood in my mouth Cause I've been biting my tongue all week I keep on talking trash But I never say anything And the talking leads to touching And the touching leads to sex And then there is no mystery left"

"And it's bad news, I don't blame you I do the same thing, I get lonely too And you're bad news, my friends tell me to leave you That you're bad news..."

"I read with every broken heart We should become more adventurous"

"I had one friend in high school, recently he hung himself with string, His note said "If livin' is the problem, well that's just baffling." And at the wake I waited around to see my ex-first love, And I barely recognized her but I knew exactly what she was thinkin' of .We sat quietly in the corner, whisperin' close about loss, And I remembered why I loved her and I asked her why I drove her off."

"And you're not happy but you're funny and I'm tripping over my joy. I just keep on gettin up again."

"This music is forever for me. It's the stage thing, that rush moment that you live for. It never lasts, but that's what you live for."

"Music was my way of keeping people from looking through and around me. I wanted the heavies to know I was around."

"I think what's happening now is people want to forget. There was Vietnam, there was Watergate, there was Iran – we were beaten, we were hustled, and then we were humiliated. And I think people got a need to feel good about the country they live in. But what's happening, I think, is that that need – which is a good thing – is gettin' manipulated and exploited. And you see the Reagan reelection ads on TV – you know: "It's morning in America." And you say, well, it's not morning in Pittsburgh. It's not morning above 125th Street in New York. It's midnight, and, like, there's a bad moon risin'. And that's why when Reagan mentioned my name in New Jersey, I felt it was another manipulation, and I had to disassociate myself from the president's kind words."

"Your success story is a bigger story than whatever you’re trying to say on stage... Success makes life easier. It doesn’t make living easier."

"We're here to re-dedicate you to The Power, The Passion, The Mystery, and The Ministry of Rock and Roll."

"The country we carry in our hearts is waiting. And together, we can move America towards her deepest ideals. And besides, we had a sax player in the House. We need a guitar player in the White House."

"I don’t think anybody truly knows where we’re going from here yet. It depends on too many unknowns. We don’t know where the COVID virus is going to take us. We don’t know where Black Lives Matter is going to take us right now. Do we get a real practical conversation going about race and policing and ultimately about the economic inequality that’s been a stain on our social contract? And of course, nobody knows where our next election is going to take us. I believe that our current president is a threat to our democracy. He simply makes any kind of reform that much harder. I don’t know if our democracy could stand another four years of his custodianship. These are all existential threats to our democracy and our American way of life."

"I have the feeling that the night you look at your audience and don't see yourself, and the night the audience looks at you and doesn't see themselves reflected in you, it's all over."

"At this point, I don’t need my records to be Number One or sell as many as this person or that person. That’s not fundamentally important — I don’t believe that sustains you."

"In the third grade a nun stuffed me in a garbage can under her desk because she said that’s where I belonged."

"There ain't a note that I play on stage that can’t be traced back directly to my mother and father."

"The first day I can remember looking into a mirror and being able to stand what I saw was the day I had a guitar in my hand."

"You ride in a limousine the first time, it’s a big thrill but after that it’s just a stupid car."

"I was bruised and battered and I couldn't tell What I felt. I was unrecognizable to myself. I saw my reflection in a window I didn't know My own face. Oh brother are you gonna leave me? Wastin' away On the streets of Philadelphia."

"Ain't no angel gonna greet me. It's just you and I my friend. My clothes don't fit me no more. I walked a thousand miles Just to slip this skin."

"She'll let you in her house If you come knockin' late at night. She'll let you in her mouth If the words you say are right. If you pay the price, She'll let you deep inside. But there's a secret garden she hides."

"Blind faith in your leaders, or in anything, will get you killed."

"And she was blinded by the light. Cut loose like a deuce, Another runner in the night. Blinded by the light. She got down but she never got tight, but she'll make it alright."

"Mama always told me not to look into the eyes of the sun. But Mama, that's where the fun is ..."

"I stood stonelike at midnight, suspended in my masquerade. I combed my hair till it was just right and commanded the night brigade. I was open to pain and crossed by the rain and I walked on a crooked crutch. I strolled all alone through a fallout zone and came out with my soul untouched."

"And your strength is devastating in the face of all these odds. Remember how I kept you waiting when it was my turn to be the god."

"And we danced all night to a soul fairy band. And she kissed me just right like only a lonely angel can. She felt just right just like as sweet as a spirit in the night. In the night baby don't know what she do to you? Spirits in the night, in the night. Stand up now and let her shoot right through you."

"Did you hear the cops finally busted Madame Marie for tellin' fortunes better than they do? For me this boardwalk life is through, babe. You ought to quit this scene too."

"Rosalita jump a little lighter. Senorita come sit by my fire. I just want to be your love, ain't no lie. Rosalita you're my stone desire."

"Now I know your mama she don't like me 'cause I play in a rock and roll band. And I know your daddy he don't dig me but he never did understand. Papa lowered the boom, he locked you in your room; I'm comin' to lend a hand. I'm comin' to liberate you, confiscate you, I want to be your man. Someday we'll look back on this and it will all seem funny."

"Don't run back inside Darling you know just what I'm here for. So you're scared and you're thinking That maybe we ain't that young anymore. Show a little faith, there's magic in the night; You ain't a beauty but hey you're all right. Oh and that's all right with me."

"Hey what else can we do now? Except roll down the window And let the wind blow back your hair. Well the night's busting open, These two lanes will take us anywhere. We got one last chance to make it real, To trade in these wings on some wheels. Climb in back, heaven's waiting on down the tracks. Oh come take my hand, We're riding out tonight to case the promised land. Oh Thunder Road, oh Thunder Road. Thunder Road."

"And in the lonely cool before dawn, You hear their engines roaring on. But when you get to the porch they're gone on the wind. So Mary climb in. It's a town full of losers, And I'm pulling out of here to win."

"I'm stranded in the jungle, Taking all the heat they was giving. The night is dark but the sidewalk's bright And lined with the light of the living. From a tenement window a transistor blasts, Turn around the corner things got real quiet real fast. She hit me with a Tenth Avenue freeze-out. Tenth Avenue freeze-out."

"And the world is busting at its seams; And you're just a prisoner of your dreams. Holding on for your life 'cause you work all day To blow 'em away in the night."

"Laying here in the dark you're like an angel on my chest, Just another tramp of hearts crying tears of faithlessness. Remember all the movies, Terry, we'd go see? Trying to learn how to walk like heroes we thought we had to be. And after all this time to find we're just like all the rest, Stranded in the park and forced to confess To hiding on the backstreets, hiding on the backstreets. We swore forever friends on the backstreets until the end, Hiding on the backstreets, hiding on the backstreets."

"In the day we sweat it out on the streets of a runaway American dream. At night we ride through mansions of glory in suicide machines. Sprung from cages on Highway 9, Chrome-wheeled, fuel-injected And steppin' out over the line. Baby this town rips the bones from your back. It's a death trap, it's a suicide rap. We gotta get out while we're young, 'Cause tramps like us, baby we were born to run."

"The highway's jammed with broken heroes On a last chance power drive. Everybody's out on the run tonight But there's no place left to hide. Together, Wendy, we can live with the sadness. I'll love you with all the madness in my soul. Someday girl, I don't know when we're gonna get to that place Where we really want to go and we'll walk in the sun. But till then tramps like us, baby we were born to run."

"The street's alive as secret debts are paid. Contacts made, they vanished unseen. Kids flash guitars just like switch-blades hustling for the record machine. The hungry and the hunted explode into rock'n'roll bands That face off against each other out in the street, down in Jungleland."

"Outside the street's on fire in a real death waltz Between flesh and what's fantasy and the poets down here Don't write nothing at all, they just stand back and let it all be. And in the quick of the night they reach for their moment And try to make an honest stand but they wind up wounded, not even dead Tonight in Jungleland."

"Badlands, you gotta live it everyday. Let the broken hearts stand As the price you've gotta pay. We'll keep pushin' till it's understood And these badlands start treating us good."

"Poor man want to be rich Rich man want to be king And a king ain't satisfied Till he rules everything. I want to go out tonight I want to find out what I got."

"Well, I believe in the love that you gave me I believe in the faith that can save me I believe in the hope And I pray that some day it may raise me Above these badlands"

"For the ones who had a notion, A notion deep inside, That it ain't no sin to be glad you're alive."

"In the Bible Cain slew Abel and East of Eden he was cast. You're born into this life paying for the sins of somebody else's past. Daddy worked his whole life for nothing but the pain. Now he walks these empty rooms looking for something to blame. You inherit the sins, you inherit the flames. Adam raised a Cain."

"Some guys they just give up living, And start dying little by little, piece by piece. Some guys come home from work and wash up And go racin' in the street.Tonight, tonight the strip's just right. I wanna blow 'em all out of their seats. Calling out around the world, we're going racin' in the street."

"There's a dark cloud rising from the desert floor. I packed my bags and I'm heading straight into the storm. Gonna be a twister to blow everything down That ain't got the faith to stand its ground. Blow away the dreams that tear you apart, Blow away the dreams that break your heart. Blow away the lies that leave you nothing but lost and brokenhearted."

"Everybody's got a hunger, a hunger they can't resist; There's so much that you want, you deserve much more than this. But if dreams came true, oh, wouldn't that be nice? But this ain't no dream we're living through tonight. Girl, you want it, you take it, you pay the price."

"Everybody's got a secret Sonny, Something that they just can't face. Some folks spend their whole lives trying to keep it; They carry it with them every step that they take. Till some day they just cut it loose. Cut it loose or let it drag 'em down Where no one asks any questions, Or looks too long in your face In the darkness on the edge of town."

"Cheap romance, it's all just a crutch. You don't want nothin' that anybody can touch. You're so afraid of being somebody's fool, Not walkin' tough baby, not walkin' cool. You walk cool, but darlin', can you walk the line? And face the ties that bind. The ties that bind, Now you can't break the ties that bind."

"Well let there be sunlight, let there be rain. Let the brokenhearted love again. Sherry we can run with our arms open before the tide"

"Now I don't know what it always was with us. We chose the words, and yeah, we drew the lines. There was just no way this house could hold the two of us. I guess that we were just too much of the same kind."

"Got a wife and kids in Baltimore Jack; I went out for a ride and I never went back. Like a river that don't know where it's flowing, I took a wrong turn and I just kept going"

"Then I got Mary pregnant and man that was all she wrote. And for my nineteenth birthday I got a union card and a wedding coat. We went down to the courthouse and the judge put it all to rest. No wedding day smiles no walk down the aisle, No flowers no wedding dress.That night we went down to the river. And into the river we'd dive. Oh down to the river we did ride."

"Is a dream a lie if it don't come true Or is it something worse?"

"I was gonna be your Romeo you were gonna be my Juliet. These days you don't wait on Romeo's, You wait on that welfare check."

"Well now you say you've found another man who does things to you that I can't, And that no matter what I do it's all over now between me and you girl. But I can't believe what you say; No I can't believe what you say 'cause babyI don't wanna fade away. Oh I don't wanna fade away. Tell me what can I do, what can I say 'Cause darlin' I don't wanna fade away."

"Sometimes I sit up in the darkness, And I watch my baby as she sleeps. Then I climb in bed and I hold her tight. I just lay there awake in the middle of the night, Thinking 'bout the wreck on the highway."

"I can't say that I'm sorry for the things that we done; At least for a little while sir me and her we had us some fun."

"Well now everything dies baby that's a fact, But maybe everything that dies someday comes back. Put your makeup on, fix your hair up pretty, And meet me tonight in Atlantic City."

"Well they closed down the auto plant in Mahwah late that month. Ralph went out lookin' for a job but he couldn't find none. He came home too drunk from mixin' Tanqueray and wine. He got a gun shot a night clerk now they call'm Johnny 99."

"I catch him when he's strayin' like any brother would. Man turns his back on his family well he just ain't no good."

"Born down in a dead man's town, The first kick I took was when I hit the ground. You end up like a dog that's been beat too much, Till you spend half your life just covering up."

"The times are tough now, just getting tougher. This old world is rough, it's just getting rougher. Cover me, come on baby, cover me. Well I'm looking for a lover who will come on in and cover me."

"Sometimes it's like someone took a knife baby, edgy and dull And cut a six-inch valley through the middle of my soul.At night I wake up with the sheets soaking wet And a freight train running through the middle of my head. Only you can cool my desire. I'm on fire."

"We busted out of class had to get away from those fools; We learned more from a three minute record than we ever learned in school. Tonight I hear the neighborhood drummer sound; I can feel my heart begin to pound. You say you're tired and you just want to close your eyes and follow your dreams down."

"Now you hung with me when all the others turned away turned up their nose. We liked the same music, we liked the same bands, we liked the same clothes. We told each other that we were the wildest, the wildest things we'd ever seen. Now I wished you would have told me, I wished I could have talked to you. Just to say goodbye Bobby Jean."

"I pull you close but when we kiss I can feel a doubt. I remember back when we started, My kisses used to turn you inside out. I used to drive you to work in the morning; Friday night I'd drive you all around. You used to love to drive me wild, But lately girl you get your kicks from just driving me down."

"Now I think I'm going down to the well tonight And I'm going to drink till I get my fill. And I hope when I get old I don't sit around thinking about it, But I probably will. Yeah, just sitting back trying to recapture A little of the glory of, Well time slips away and leaves you with nothing mister but boring stories of glory days."

"You can't start a fire, sitting 'round crying over a broken heart. This gun's for hire, Even if we're just dancing in the dark. You can't start a fire, worrying about your little world falling apart. This gun's for hire, Even if we're just dancing in the dark."

"Last night me and Kate we laid in bed talking about getting out. Packing up our bags maybe heading south. I'm thirty-five, we got a boy of our own now. Last night I sat him up behind the wheel and said son take a good look around. This is your hometown."

"Well it's Saturday night you're all dressed up in blue. I been watching you awhile, maybe you been watching me too. So somebody ran out, left somebody's heart in a mess. Well if you're looking for love, honey I'm tougher than the rest."

"Spare parts And broken hearts Keep the world turnin' around."

"It ought to be easy, ought to be simple enough. Man meets woman and they fall in love. But the house is haunted and the ride gets rough. And you've got to learn to live with what you can't rise above If you want to ride on down in through this tunnel of love."

"Now you play the loving woman; I'll play the faithful man. But just don't look too close into the palm of my hand."

"Tonight our bed is cold; I'm lost in the darkness of our love. God have mercy on the man Who doubts what he's sure of."

"Baby, in a world without pity, Do you think what I'm askin's too much? I just want to feel you in my arms, Share a little of that Human Touch. Feel a little of that Human Touch. Give me a little of that Human Touch."

"If the angels are unkind or the season is dark, Or if in the end Love just falls apart. Well then here's to our destruction. Baby let me be your soul driver."

"So I bought a .44 magnum, it was solid steel cast. And in the blessed name of Elvis well I just let it blast. 'Til my TV lay in pieces there at my feet And they busted me for disturbin' the almighty peace. Judge said "What you got in your defense son?" "Fifty-seven channels and nothin' on." I can see by your eyes friend you're just about gone. Fifty-seven channels and nothin' on... Fifty-seven channels and nothin'"

"Now a life of leisure and a pirate's treasure Don't make much for tragedy. But it's a sad man my friend who's livin' in his own skin And can't stand the company. Every fool's got a reason to feelin' sorry for himself And turn his heart to stone. Tonight this fool's halfway to heaven and just a mile outta hell, And I feel like I'm comin' home."

"Well here's to your good looks baby, now here's to my health. Here's to the loaded places that we take ourselves. When it comes to luck, you make your own. Tonight I got dirt on my hands but I'm building me a new home."

"Well the highway is alive tonight, But nobody’s kiddin’ nobody about where it goes. I’m sittin’ down here in the campfire light Searchin’ for the ghost of Tom Joad."

"When I die I don't want no part of heaven. I would not do heaven's work well. I pray the devil comes and takes me To stand in the fiery furnaces of hell."

"They found him shot dead outside Stockton, His body lyin' on a muddy hill. Nothin' taken, nothin' stolen; Somebody killed him just to kill."

"Hell's brewin', dark sun's on the rise. This storm'll blow through by and by. House is on fire, viper's in the grass; A little revenge and this too shall pass. This too shall pass, I'm gonna pray. Right now all I got's this lonesome day."

"Better ask questions before you shoot, Deceit and betrayal's bitter fruit. It's hard to swallow, come time to pay That taste on your tongue don't easily slip away. Let kingdom come I'm gonna find my way Through this lonesome day."

"May your strength give us strength. May your faith give us faith. May your hope give us hope. May your love give us love."

"It's rainin' but there ain't a cloud in the sky; Musta been a tear from your eye. Everything'll be okay. Funny, thought I felt a sweet summer breeze; Musta been you sighin' so deep. Don't worry we're gonna find a way."

"It's a fairytale so tragic, There's no prince to break the spell. I don't believe in magic, But for you I will, for you I will. If I'm a fool, I'll be a fool. Darlin' for you."

"Now I been out in the desert, just doin' my time. Searchin' through the dust, lookin' for a sign. If there's a light up ahead well brother I don't know. But I got this fever burnin' in my soul. So let's take the good times as they go, And I'll meet you further on up the road."

"Trees on fire with the first fall's frost Long black line in front of Holy Cross Blood moon risin' in a sky of black dust Tell me Baby who do you trust? The fuse is burning Shut out the lights The fuse is burning Come on let me do you right."

"Can't see nothin' in front of me; Can't see nothin' coming up behind. I make my way through this darkness; I can't feel nothing but this chain that binds me. Lost track of how far I've gone, How far I've gone, how high I've climbed. On my back's a sixty pound stone, On my shoulder a half mile line."

"Come on up for the rising. Come on up, lay your hands in mine. Come on up for the rising. Come on up for the rising tonight."

"There is a blood red circle On the cold dark ground. And the rain is falling down. The church door's thrown open; I can hear the organ's song. But the congregation's gone. My city of ruins. My city of ruins."

"Come on, rise up! Come on, rise up!"

"I got my finger on the trigger But I don't know who to trust. When I look into your eyes There's just devils and dust. We're a long, long way from home, Bobbie. Home's a long, long way from us. I feel a dirty wind blowing Devils and dust."

"I got God on my side. I'm just trying to survive. What if what you do to survive Kills the things you love? Fear's a powerful thing; It can turn your heart black you can trust. It'll take your God filled soul And fill it with devils and dust"

"I was tryin' to find my way home, But all I heard was a drone Bouncing off a satellite, Crushin' the last lone American night. This is radio nowhere, is there anybody alive out there? This is radio nowhere, is there anybody alive out there?"

"She went away, she cut me like a knife. Hello beautiful thing, maybe you could save my life. In just a glance, down here on magic street, Loves a fool's dance And I ain't got much sense, but I still got my feet."

"The wise men were all fools, what to do?"

"Here everybody has a neighbor, Everybody has a friend. Everybody has a reason to begin again."

"My father said "Son, we're lucky in this town. It's a beautiful place to be born. It just wraps its arms around you. Nobody crowds you, nobody goes it alone. That you know flag flying over the courthouse Means certain things are set in stone: Who we are, what we'll do and what we won't.""

"When they built you brother, they turned this dust to gold. When they built you brother, they broke the mold."

"Out of the East on an Irish stallion came bounty hunter Dan. His heart quickened and burdened by the need to get his man. He found Pete peacefully fishing by the river. Pulled his gun and got the drop. He said "Pete you think you've changed but you have not.""

"I've seen strong hearts give way To the burdens of the day, To the weary hands of time Where fortune is not kind."

"I'm working on a dream, Though trouble can feel like it's here to stay. I'm working on a dream; Our love will chase the trouble away."

"Have you ever seen a one trick pony in the field so happy and free/ If you've ever seen a one trick pony then you've seen me. Have you ever seen a one legged dog makin' his way down the street? If you've ever seen a one legged dog then you've seen me."

"I been knocking on the door that holds the throne. I been looking for the map that leads me home. I been stumbling on good hearts turned to stone. The road of good intentions has gone dry as a bone. We take care of our own. We take care of our own. Wherever this flag’s flown, We take care of our own."

"Well, no cannon ball did fly, no rifles cut us down. No bombs fell from the sky, no blood soaked the ground. No powder flash blinded the eye. No deathly thunder sounded. But just as sure as the hand of God, They brought death to my hometown. They brought death to my hometown."

"Tend to your flock or they will stray. We’ll be called for our service come judgment day. Before we cross that river wide, The blood on our hands will come back on us twice."

"This train... Carries saints and sinners. This train... Carries losers and winners. This train... Carries whores and gamblers. This train... Carries lost souls.I said this train... Dreams will not be thwarted. This train... Faith will be rewarded."

"Is it a gun, is it a knife? Is it a wallet, this is your life? It ain't no secret, It ain't no secret, No secret my friend. You can get killed just for living In your American skin."

"We all come up a little short and we go down hard. These days I spend my time skipping through the dark. Through the empires of dust, I chant your name. I am the hunter of invisible game."

"I think music changed when Bruce Springsteen came on the scene. I think if it wasn't for Bruce Springsteen, we may have gone in a very scary direction. We may have gotten to the point where disco music ruled and I would have had to quit."

"Here was a dude who carried himself like Brando, Dylan, and Elvis. If John Steinbeck could sing, if Van Morrison could ride a Harley-Davidson. But he was something new, too. He was the first whiff of Scorsese, the first hint of Patti Smith, Elvis Costello, and the Clash. He was the end of long hair, brown rice and bell bottoms. It was the end of the 20-minute drum solo. It was good night, Haight-Ashbury; hello, Asbury Park."

"America was staggering when Springsteen appeared. The president had just resigned in disgrace. The U.S. had lost its first war. There was going to be no more oil in the ground. The days of cruising and big cars were supposed to be over. But Bruce Springsteen's vision was bigger than a Honda, it was bigger than a Subaru. Bruce made you believe that dreams were still out there, but after loss and defeat, they had to be braver, not just bigger."

"We call him the Boss. Well that's a bunch of crap. He's not the boss. He works for us."

"Bruce Springsteen feels familiar to us. But it's not an easy familiarity, is it? Even his band seems to stand taller when he walks in the room. It's complex. He's America's writer, and critic. It's like in Badlands, he's Martin Sheen and Terrence Malick. To be so accessible and so private, there's a rubric. But then again, he is an Irish-Italian, with a Jewish-sounding name. What more do you want? Add one big African sax player, and no one in this room is gonna fuck with you!"

"In 1974, I was 14. Even I knew the '60s were over. It was the era of soft-rock infusion. The Beatles were gone, Elvis was in Vegas. What was goin' on? Nothin' was goin' on. Bruce Springsteen was comin' on, saving music from the phonies, saving lyrics from the folkies, saving black leather jackets from the Fonz."

"The label of liberalism is hardly a sentence to public igominy: otherwise Bruce Springsteen would still be rehabilitating used Cadillacs in Asbury Park and Jane Fonda, for all we know, would be just another overweight housewife."

"I couldn't believe how happy his music made me and how good it was. He's a gift, and I didn't know. I mean, I knew 'Born in the USA' and 'Glory Days,' but I didn't know that he covered so much ground, and there was something in his music that touched what I was going through, the process of falling back in love with my America."

"Bruce Springsteen put it best in 2004 when he said: "America is not always right. That's a fairy tale for children.... But one thing America should always be is true. And it's in seeking her truth, both the good and the bad, that we find a deeper patriotism, that we find a more authentic experience as citizens, that we find the power that is embedded only in truth to change our world for the better.""

"Bruce Springsteen released a fiery protest song Wednesday dedicated to the memory of Renee Good and Alex Pretti, two Minneapolis residents who were fatally shot by federal agents this month. “Streets of Minneapolis,” which Springsteen wrote Saturday and recorded Tuesday, is a “response to the state terror being visited on the city,” he said in a post on Instagram. He added that the song is also for “the people of Minneapolis” and “our innocent immigrant neighbors.” Daily life for residents in the Minnesota city has been upended in the weeks since 3,000 federal agents flooded the streets for an immigration crackdown operation. The song, which is about four and a half minutes long, denounces U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and calls out Trump administration officials by name, including Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller and President Donald Trump himself."

"Springsteen had previously responded to the events unfolding in Minneapolis during a performance at the Light of Day Winterfest concert in Red Bank, New Jersey. Before he played his hit “The Promised Land,” he dedicated the song to Good’s memory, according to cellphone video from the performance shared by NJ-dot-com. In the video, Springsteen characterized federal law enforcement participating in the Trump administration’s crackdown as “heavily armed, masked federal troops invading an American city, using Gestapo tactics against their fellow citizens.” Springsteen also said he wrote the song “as an ode to American possibility” and added that the United States’ set of ideals and values is “being tested as it has never been in modern times.” He told the crowd he hoped his message would reach Trump. “If you believe you don’t deserve to be murdered for exercising your American right to protest, then send a message to this president. And as the mayor of that city has said: ‘ICE should get the f--- out of Minneapolis,” Springsteen told a supportive home-state crowd, echoing the words of Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey."

"Last Thursday, at the Harvard Square theatre, I saw my rock'n'roll past flash before my eyes. And I saw something else: I saw rock and roll future and its name is Bruce Springsteen. And on a night when I needed to feel young, he made me feel like I was hearing music for the very first time."

"Our love is like a Bruce Springsteen concert. It's not that great, it's really long. But wow! What energy."

"The reason I’m running for president is because I can’t be Bruce Springsteen."

"Our slot was immediately before Bruce Springsteen, who was headlining that night. It was his birthday and people were yelling "Bruuuuuce," you know, all night long. And Jackson Browne, at the side of the stage, he says to me "Now listen, if you go on and you think they're booing you, don't, don't get thrown because they're really just saying 'Bruce.'" And I said, "Well, what's the difference?'""

"Too bad the guy's name wasn't Melvin or something."

"Whenever I see Bruce Springsteen do anything, he empties the tank. Every time. And the beautiful thing about this man is he empties that tank for his family, he empties that tank for his art, he empties that tank for his audience, and he empties it for his country. And we, on the receiving end of that beautiful gift, are ourselves rejuvenated, if not, redeemed."

"Art is... a reflection of a greater divine creation. There really is no separation."

"Once when we moved away, She came to Romulus for a day. Her Chevrolet broke down. We prayed it'd never be fixed or be found."

"Rest in my arms Sleep in my bed There's a design To what I did and said"

"You gave your body to the lonely, They took your clothes. You gave up a wife and a family You gave your ghost. To be alone with me. To be alone with me You went up on a tree. I've never met a man who loved me."

"Oh, great intentions, Covenant with the imitation Have you no conscience? I think about it now Oh, God of Progress, Have you degraded or forgot us? Where have your laws gone?"

"He dressed up like a clown for them With his face paint white and red. And on his best behavior In a dark room on the bed, He kissed them all."

"But in my best behavior, I am really just like him Look beneath the floorboards, for the secrets I have hid."

"Tuesday morning at the Bible study We lift our hands and pray over your body But nothing ever happens"

"In the morning when you finally go And the nurse runs in with her head hung low, And the cardinal hits the window. In the morning in the winter shade, On the first of March, on the holiday, I thought I saw you breathing."

"All the glory when He took our place, But He took my shoulders and He shook my face, And He takes and He takes and He takes."

"Oh, I am not quite sleeping. Oh, I am fast in bed."

"Thinking Outrageously, I Write in Cursive"

""It's been a long long time since I've memorized your face."

"Words are futile devices."

"When I die, when I die, I'll rot. But when I live, but when I live, I'll give it all I've got."

"At least I deserve the respect of a kiss goodbye."

"Somewhere I lost whatever else I had."

"I know I've caused you trouble, I know I've caused you pain. But I must do the right thing; I must do myself a favour And get real, get right with the Lord."

"I want it all, I want it all for myself."

"I'm not fucking around."

"Ah, ah, Beautiful is the mother. Ah, ah, Beautiful is her son."

"Somewhere in the desert, there's a forest And an acre before us But I don't know where to begin"

"I forgive you mother; I can hear you And I long to be near you But every road leads to an end"

"When I was three Three, maybe four She left us at that video store"

"Found myself on Spencer's Butte Traced your shadow with my shoe Empty outline changed my view Now all of me thinks less of you"

"Some part of me was lost in your sleeve Where you hid your cigarettes"

"What's left is only bittersweet For the rest of my life, admitting the best is behind me Now I'm drunk and afraid Wishing the world would go away What's the point of singing songs If they'll never even hear you?"

"Well you do enough talk My little hawk, why do you cry? Tell me what did you learn From the Tillamook burn Or the Fourth of July? We're all gonna die"

"Should I tear my eyes out now? Everything I see returns to you somehow Should I tear my heart out now? Everything I feel returns to you somehow"

"I am a man with a heart that offends with its lonely and greedy demands."

"I love you more than the world can contain in its lonely and ramshackle head."

"There's only a shadow of me In a manner of speaking, I'm dead"

"Fuck me, I'm falling apart"

"Planes will crash, He'll never let you down. So maybe there's a crash coming for the ground, Seek His face, He'll never let you down. Worship grace, He'll never let you down."

"Did I make you cry On Christmas day? Did I let you down Like every other day? Did I make you cry On Christmas day? Did I let you down On Christmas day? . . . I stay awake at night After we have a fight I'm writing poems about you And they aren't very nice."

"If I miss my chance, I didn't even try I'm not one to regret Christmas in July."

"Since it's Christmas, let's be glad Even if your life's been bad, There are presents to be had."

"Young people are very cynical now, you know? Very cynical! They've been taught cynicism, they've been — they've been bred cynicism. So, I think it's important to give them hope and realism in the same package, you know? You can be realistic but there should be — there should be hope in it. Because hope's what we're about. If we don't have hope then we don't go on."

"I think for it to be unhip to be idealistic is weird, you know? I mean, even all the best rebels to me had some sense of hope in them."

"I don't understand the ones that have no sense of hope and invest in hate. That's not gonna work out, you know? It's a waste of your time!"

"You don't hear any more of, 'Hey, we did something creative and we turned a profit, how about that?' Everywhere we look, we want to make the most money possible. This is a dangerous, corrupt notion. That's where you see the advent of programming on the radio, and radio research, all these silly things. That has made pop music what it is today. Everything — morals, truth — is all going out the window in favor of profit."

"I don't think it's a good attitude in your life to feel that you have to be rich to have self-esteem. You know, I saw a billboard in New York I wish I had photographed. It was for the TNN network. It said three words against a patriotic background of red, white and blue — BIGGER, YOUNGER, RICHER. Now, I find that fascinating: 'Bigger, younger, richer.' This whole idea of being wealthy has gone too far. I never ride in a limousine, you know. I feel gross if I get in a limousine. One good thing about the sixties was it sort of was the opposite back then. You looked silly trying to appear rich."

"It's funny how the music industry is enraged about the Internet and the way things are copied without being paid for. But you know why people steal the music? Because they can't afford the music. I'm not condoning downloading music for free. I don't think that's really fair, but I understand it. If you brought CD prices back down to $8.98, you would solve a lot of the industry's problems."

"An act like ours wouldn't even be around today if someone hadn't brought us along and let us make mistakes and grow at our own pace. Today it seems that if you don't have a hit — or even if you do — they have no use for you the next time."

"I'm frustrated by what I hear. Maybe it's not meant for me. Personally, I'm way too bright for a lot of the hip-hop lyrics to affect. I'm much too smart to think that jewelry or how cool I am is really going to change much about my personality. If you're dumb enough that it entertains you, have a great time. But I am seeking more than that."

"I don't believe in censorship, but I do believe that an artist has to take some moral responsibility for what he or she is putting out there. And I think a lot of these young kids are going to have to learn the hard way before they realize that you can actually do some damage if you're being careless or frivolous in what you're saying."

"I think television's become a downright dangerous thing. It has no moral barometer whatsoever. If you want to talk about something that is all about money, just watch the television. It's damn dangerous. TV does not care about you or what happens to you. It's downright bad for your health now, and that's not a far-out concept. I think watching the TV news is bad for you. It is bad for your physical health and your mental health. The music business looks like, you know, innocent schoolboys compared to the TV business. They care about nothing but profit."

"Artists aren't necessarily business people. And they aren't necessarily aware of all the things that go on in their names. Some just want to make some music, but there is a lot of greed among artists as well. Whether or not we know it, we are all to blame. I think it's time — starting with the artist — to try to be a little more responsible and aware of what goes on in our name."

"I feel sorry for kids these days. They get so much homework. Remember the days when we put a belt around our two books and carried them home? Now they're dragging a suitcase. They have school all day, then homework from six until eleven. There's no time left to be creative. The hardest part for me is when my thirteen-year-old is complaining about the workload. I agree with him. I'm supposed to be responsible and support the teacher. But it's like, "You're right, son. This is bullshit.""

"If we're born in God's image, then God knows how we can fuck up. And he knows that you really didn't mean it."

"It’s very uncomfortable to hear them used when I don’t agree with what’s being said. But I recognize that those songs have entered into a bigger life, a life all their own. They belong to the audience. How they’re used isn’t always something I can control."

"It's alright if you love me, It's alright if you don't. I'm not afraid of you runnin' away, Honey I get the feeling you won't."

"There is no sense in pretending, Your eyes give you away. Something inside you is feeling like I do, We've said all there is to say."

"Well she was an American girl, raised on promises. She couldn't help thinkin' that there was a little more to life somewhere else. After all, it was a great big world with lots of places to run to. Yeah, and if she had to die tryin', she had one little promise she was gonna keep."

"And for one desperate moment There he crept back in her memory. God it's so painful, something that's so close Is still so far out of reach."

"Little miss queen of hearts you're a strange thing. Why you wanna stay so vague? I'm wandering through this mess you've made To see what I can save."

"I need to know(I need to know) I need to know(I need to know) If you think you're gonna leave, Then you better say so."

"She's gonna listen to her heart. It's gonna tell her what to do. She might need a lot of loving, But she don't need you."

"Restless sleep, twisted dreams Moving targets, silent screams. Restless city, restless street Restless you, restless me."

"My baby is a rock n' roller."

"Somewhere, somehow somebody Must have kicked you around some. Tell me why you wanna lay there And revel in your abandon. Listen it don't make no difference to me baby, Everybody's had to fight to be free. You see you don't have to live like a refugee"

"You know, sometimes, I don't know why, But this old town just seems so hopeless. I ain't really sure, but it seems I remember the good times Were just a little bit more in focus."

"It just seems so useless to have to work so hard, And nothin' ever really seems to come from it."

"I just catch myself wonderin', waitin', worryin' bout some silly little things that don't add up to nothin'."

"And I'd show you stars you never could see Baby, it couldn't have been that easy to forget about me."

"Baby, even the losers get lucky sometimes. Even the losers keep a little bit of pride. They get lucky sometimes."

"I was talkin' with a friend of mine, Said a woman done hurt his pride. Told him that she loved him so, then Turned around and let him go. Then he said "you'd better watch your step" Or you're gonna get hurt yourself. Someone's gonna tell you lies Cut you down to size..."

"Louisiana rain now is falling just like tears. Running down my face washing out the years. Louisiana rain is soaking through my shoes. I may never be the same when I reach Baton Rouge."

"Oh baby, don't it feel like heaven right now, Don't it feel like something from a dream."

"The waiting is the hardest part. Every day you see one more card. You take it on faith, you take it to the heart. The waiting is the hardest part."

"She's a woman in love And he's gonna break her heart to pieces. She don't want to see. She's a woman in love, but it's not me."

"Somewhere deep in the middle of the night, Lovers hold each other tight. Whisper in their anxious ears, Words of love that disappear."

"I'm an insider, I been burned by the fire. And I've had to live with some hard promises. I've crawled through the briars, I'm an insider."

"Good love is hard to find. You got lucky, babe. You got lucky, babe, when I found you."

"Well I fought for you; I fought too hard. To do it all again babe, It's gone too far."

"I don't believe the good times are over. I don't believe the thrill is all gone. Real love is a man's salvation; The weak ones fall, the strong carry on."

"Honey don't walk out, I'm too drunk to follow. You know you won't feel this way tomorrow. Well, maybe I'm a little rough around the edges, Inside a little hollow. I get faced with some things sometimes That are so hard to swallow."

"I was born a rebel Down in Dixie on a Sunday morning. Yeah, with one foot in the grave, And one foot on the pedal. I was born a rebel."

"I don't feel you anymore. You darken my door. Whatever you're looking for. Hey don't come around here no more."

"There's a southern accent, where I come from. The young 'uns call it country, the Yankees call it dumb."

"For just a minute there I was dreaming. For just a minute it was all so real. For just a minute she was standing there, with me."

"Yeah and it's over before you know it. It all goes by so fast. Yeah, the bad nights last forever, And the good nights don't ever seem to last"

"Wherever you are tonight, I wish you the best of everything, in the world. And I hope you found Whatever you were looking for."

"Take back your insurance, Baby nothin's guaranteed."

"There were times apart, there were times together. I was pledged to her for worse or better. When it mattered most I let her down. That's the way it goes, it'll all work out."

"'Cause it can feel like perfection, But never all the time. And you don't wanna be alone again. Oh my, my."

"And no I can't find no reason to explain the way that I feel. I remember things being more clearer, at one time things were more real."

"All the vampires walkin' through the valley Move west down Ventura Boulevard. And all the bad boys are standing in the shadows All the good girls are home with broken hearts."

"I wanna glide down over Mulholland. I wanna write her name in the sky. Gonna free fall out into nothing. Gonna leave this world for a while."

"Well I won't back down, No I won't back down. You could stand me up at the gates of hell, But I won't back down."

"No I'll stand my ground, won't be turned around And I'll keep this world from draggin' me down Gonna stand my ground, And I won't back down."

"Well I know what's right, I got just one life In a world that keeps on pushin' me around But I'll stand my ground And I won't back down."

"It was a beautiful day, the sun beat down; I had the radio on, I was drivin'. The trees went by, me and Del were singin', Little runaway, I was flyin'.Yeah runnin' down a dream That never would come to me. Workin' on a mystery, goin' wherever it leads. I'm runnin' down a dream."

"I felt so good, like anything was possible. I hit cruise control and rubbed my eyes. The last three days the rain was unstoppable. And it was always cold, no sunshine."

"But not me, baby, I've got you to save me. Aw, yer so bad. Best thing I've ever had. In a world gone mad, Yer so bad."

"I remember her standing in the tall grass and cattails Away from the windows at the end of the day. Watching the men from the landing in the tall hats & coat-tails. She'd never look different, but something would change."

"I'm learning to fly, But I ain't got wings. Coming down Is the hardest thing."

"Well some say life Will beat you down, And break your heart, Steal your crown.So it started out For God-knows-where. I guess I'll know When I get there."

"I don't want to end up In a room all alone Don't want to end up someone That I don't even know."

"Into the great wide open, Under them skies of blue. Out in the great wide open, A rebel without a clue."

"In the dark of the sun will you save me a place? Give me hope, give me comfort, get me to a better place?"

"Here am I a fallen arrow. My load is wide, my street is narrow. My skin is thicker, my heart is tougher. I don't mind workin', but I'm scared to suffer. You know? You know?"

"Well she grew up hard, and she grew up fast In the age of television. And she made a vow to have it all; It became her new religion."

"You and I will meet again When we're least expecting it. One day in some far off place I will recognize your face. I won't say good-bye my friend, For you and I will meet again."

"I want her more than diamonds, I want her more than gold. I want her more than anything Anyone could hold."

"Last dance with Mary Jane, one more time to kill the pain. I feel summer creepin' in and I'm tired of this town again."

"Oh, my, my. Oh, hell, yes. Honey, put on that party dress. Buy me a drink, sing me a song. Take me as I come 'cause I can't stay long."

"You belong among the wildflowers. You belong in a boat out at sea. you belong with your love on your arm. You belong somewhere you feel free."

"But let me get to the point, let's roll another joint, And turn the radio loud, I'm too alone to be proud. You don't know how it feels, You don't know how it feels, to be me."

"People come, people go. Some grow young, some grow cold."

"Think of me what you will, I've got a little space to fill."

"It's time to move on, time to get going What lies ahead I have no way of knowing. But under my feet, baby, grass is growing. It's time to move on, it' s time to get going."

"I'll be the boy in the corduroy pants. You be the girl at the high school dance."

"It's good to be king, If just for a while. To be there in velvet, yea to give 'em a smile. It's good to get high, and never comedown. It's good to be king of your own little town."

"Yeah, the world would swing if I were king. Can I help it if I still dream time to time?"

"It's good to be king and have your own way, Get a feeling of peace at the end of the day."

"It's good to be king and have your own world It helps to make friends, it's good to meet girls. A sweet little queen who can't run away; It's good to be king, whatever it pays."

"Excuse me if I Have some place in my mind Where I go time to time."

"I remember feeling this way, You can lose it without knowing. You wake up and you don't notice Which way the wind is blowing"

"If we don't get to a higher place and Find somebody, can help somebody, Might be nobody no more."

"I'm so tired of being tired. Sure as night will follow day, Most things I worry about Never happen anyway."

"You follow your feelings, you follow your dreams; You follow the leader into the trees. And what's in there waiting, neither one of us knows. You gotta keep one eye open the further you go."

"Some days are diamonds. Some days are rocks."

"Baby, you've got a heart so big, It could crush this town. But I can't hold out forever. Even walls fall down."

"I saw an angel, I saw my fate. I can only thank God it was not too late."

"Now I'm walkin' this street on my own, but she's with me wherever I go."

"I hope you never need no one, Hope you treasure your independence. I hope you never fall in love With someone like you."

"No more songs tonight, I'm drivin' to the break of day. No more words tonight, We've got enough to throw away."

"We're overdue for a dream come true. Long time, nothing new. We're overdue for a dream come true."

"I've got someone who loves me tonight. I've got over a thousand dollars in the bank, And I'm all right."

"Look deep in the eyes of love And find out what you were looking for."

"Redemption comes to those who wait, Forgiveness is the key."

"And I don't want to question or even celebrate All the joy you took and then gave back too late."

"And I don't want to mean anything to you, I don't want to tempt you to be true."

"They say be careful who you believe, Be careful who you trust. Did you smile when you pulled the trigger That dropped me in the dust?"

"Oh my love if I reveal Every secret I've concealed, How many thoughts would you steal, How much of my pain would you feel?"

"One more night, God I've had to fight To keep my line of sight on what's real One more day I fear I've lost my way I don't know how to say what I feel."

"There goes the last DJ Who plays what he wants to play, And says what he wants to say. Hey, hey, hey. There goes your freedom of choice; There goes the last human voice. There goes the last DJ."

"As we celebrate mediocrity, All the boys upstairs want to see How much you'll pay for What you used to get for free."

"There was no use in pretending, No magic left to hear. All the music gave me Was a craving for light beer."

"I keep waking up all by myself, With a blue jay in my brain. Flappin' his wings, making me sing, it was just about to rain."

"There was Rock 'N' Roll across the dial. When I think of her, it makes me smile."

"But if you shoot at everyone you see, Can't be my friend 'cause you might shoot at me."

"I can't save you from yourself, you gotta want it."

"How about a cheer For all those bad girls And all the boys That play that rock and roll? They love it Like you love Jesus. It does the same thing To their souls."

"And you may think it's all over. But there'll be more just like me Who won't give in; Who'll rise again. Can't stop a man from dreaming."

"And it's hard to say Who you are these days. But you run on anyway, Don't you baby?"

"Last time through I hid my tracks. So well I could not get back. Yeah my way was hard to find. Can't sell your soul for peace of mind."

"Always had more dogs than bones."

"You're flirting with time baby Flirting with time, but maybe, Time baby, is catching up with you."

"So if I come to your door, let me sleep on your floor. I'll give you all I have and a little more."

"Create myself down south. Impress all the women. Pretend I'm Samuel Clemens. ear seersucker and white linens."

"I'm gonna give her all my soul. I'm gonna play her Rock 'N' Roll."

"I can work, I can travel, I can sleep anywhere, Cross every border with nothing to declare. You can look back babe, but it's best not to stare."

"She's got nothing to hide, And she hides it so well. Keeps broken dreams To fix up and sell."

"There's rain on the road And the faithful have gone. In a crowd all alone, Walking 'round in a song."

"Well, they raised that horse to be a jumper He was owned by a mid-west bible thumper. His preacher was a Louisiana drummer. Took all winter, to get through the summer."

"He was caught up in a lie he half-believed, Found her hiding high in the family tree. Washed his hands, and put her 'cross his knee. She said "daddy, you've been a mother to me.""

"I'm watching the water Watching the coast Suddenly I know What I want the most And I want to tell you Still I hold back I need some time Get my life on track. I know that look on your face But there's somethin' lucky about this place And there's somethin' good comin' For you and me Somethin' good comin' There has to be."

"I know so well the look on your face And there's somethin' lucky about this place There's somethin' good comin' Just over the hill Somethin' good comin' I know it will And I'm in for the long run Wherever it goes Ridin' the river Wherever it goes."

"Some things you don't need until they leave you, they're the things that you miss"

"I'm the flame I can't get burnt"

"Everyone's trusting in their hearts, like their heart don't lie"

"If I fall along the way, pick me up and dust me off; If I get too tired to make it, be my breath so I can walk; If I need some other love then, give me more than I can stand; When my smile gets old and faded, just wait around I'll smile again; It shouldn't be so complicated, just hold me and then, just hold me again"

"Can you help me? I'm bent, I'm so scared that I'll never get put back together."

"We're all looking for something, something to be."

"Wrong step, you got off track, you need someone to help us back, now."

"I'm not crazy, I'm just a little unwell; I know right now you can't tell; But stay a while and maybe then you'll see; A different side of me"

"Well, dust off your thinking caps Solar powered plastic plants Pretty pictures of things we ate We are only what we hate But in the long run we have found Silent films are full of sound Inaudibly free Slow down everyone You're moving too fast Frames can't catch you when You're moving like that"

"Inaudible melodies Serve narrational strategies Unobtrusive tones Help to notice nothing but the zone Of visual relevancy Frame-lines tell me what to see Chopping like an axe Or maybe Eisenstein should just relax"

"Well, Plato's cave is full of freaks Demanding refunds for the things they've seen I wish they could believe In all the things that never made the screen"

"Well I know some people's they got a little less than nothing But still find some to spare And other people got more than they could use But they don't share And some people got problems man They got awful complications Other people got perfect situations With no provocation"

"Here comes another one, just like the other one Looking at himself but wishing he was someone else Because the posters on the wall they don't look like him And so he ties it up he tucks it in, he pulls it back and gives a grin Laughing at himself because he knows he ain't loved at all He knows he ain't loved at all"

"You're breaking your mind By killing the time that kills you But you can't blame the time When its only in your mind"

"It seems to me that maybe, It pretty much always means no So don't tell me you might just let it go And often times we're lazy It seems to stand in my way Cause no one no not no one Likes to be let down"

"I know she loves the sunrise No longer sees it with her sleeping eyes And I know that when she said she's gonna try Well it might not work because of other ties and I know she usually has some other ties And I wouldn't want to break 'em, nah, I wouldn't want to break 'em Maybe she'll help me to untie this but Until then well, I'm gonna have to lie too"

"His dreams are like commercials But her dreams are picture perfect and Our dreams are so related though they're often underestimated"

"Well I was eating lunch at the D. L. G. When this little girl came and she sat next to me I never seen nobody move the way she did Well she did and she does and she'll do it again. When you move like a jellyfish Rhythm don't mean nothing You go with the flow You don't stop Move like a jellyfish Rhythm is nothing You go with the flow You don't stop"

"She's the one that stumbles when she talks about The seven foreign films that she's checked out Such a fortunate fool She's just too good to be true She's such a fortunate fool"

"A billion people died on the news tonight But not so many cried at the terrible sight Well mama said It's just make believe You can't believe everything you see So baby close your eyes to the lullabies On the news tonight"

"Why don't the newscasters cry when they read about people who die? At least they could be decent enough to put just a tear in their eyes."

"We used to laugh a lot But only because we thought That everything good always would remain Nothing's gonna change there's no need to complain."

"Look who's laughing now that you've wasted How many years and you've barely even tasted Anything remotely close to Everything you've boasted about Look who's crying now."

"Losing hope is easy When your only friend is gone And every time you look around Well, it all, it all just seems to change But hanging on is easy When you've got a friend to call When nothings making sense at all You're not the only one that's afraid of change"

"Look at all those fancy clothes but these could keep us warm just like those and what about your soul, is it cold is it straight from the mold and ready to be sold and cars and phones and diamond rings, bling bling those are only removeable things and what about your mind, does it shine oh are there things that concern you more than your time"

"And I don't pretend to know what you know no no now please don't pretend to know what's on my mind if we already knew everything that everybody knows we would have nothing to learn tonight and we would have nothing to show tonight oh but everybody thinks that everybody knows about everybody else nobody knows anything about themselves cause they're all worried about everybody else."

"You can't blame me sure the killer was my son but I didn't teach him to pull the trigger of the gun It's the killing on this tv screen you can't blame me it's those images he's seen. Well you can't blame me says the media man Well I wasn't the one who came up with the plan And I just point my camera at what the people want to see Man it's a two way mirror and you can't blame me."

"It was you it was me it was every man We've all got the blood on our hands We only receive what we demand and if we want hell then hells what we'll have."

"Its always better when we're together Somewhere in between together Its always better when we're together Yeah, its always better when we're together."

"Love is the answer at least for most of the questions in my heart Like: why are we here? And where do we go? And how come it's so hard? It's not always easy and sometimes life can be deceiving I'll tell you one thing its always better when we're together."

"Never knowing Shocking but we're nothing We're just moments We're Clever but we're clueless We're just human Amusing but confusing But the truth is All we got is questions We'll Never Know."

"The telephone is singing Ringing it's too early Don't pick it up We don't need to we got everything We need right here And everything we need is enough Just so easy When the whole world fits inside of your arms Don't really need to pay attention to the alarm."

"Where'd all the good people go? I've been changin' channels I don't see them on the TV shows Where'd all the good people go? We got heaps and heaps of what we sow."

"They got this and that with a rattle a tat. Testing, one, two, man whatcha gonna do? Bad news misused, got too much to lose. Give me some truth now, whose side are we on? Whatever you say. Turn on the boob tube, I’m in the mood to obey. So lead me astray."

"And know that if I knew all of the answers I would Not hold them from you. You'd Know all the things that I'd know We told each other, there is no other way."

"Must I always be waiting, waiting on you? Must I always be playing, playing the fool?"

"Well if I was in your position I'd put down all my ammunition I'd wondered why'd it take me so long. But Lord knows that I'm not you And if I was I wouldn't be so cruel Cause waiting on love ain't so easy to do."

"Well I guess you could say That he don't even know where to begin Cause he looked both ways but he was so afraid Diggin' deeper through the ditch With every chance he missed And the mess he made Cause hate is such a strong word And every brick he laid A mistake they say That his walls are getting taller His world is getting smaller."

"Who’s to say what’s impossible? Well they forgot this world keeps spinning. And with each new day, I can feel a change in everything. And as the surface breaks, reflections fade. But in some ways they remain the same. And as my mind begins to spread it’s wings There’s no stopping curiosity."

"I want to turn the whole thing upside down. I’ll find the things they say just can’t be found. I’ll share this love I find with everyone. We’ll sing and dance to mother nature’s songs. I don’t want this feeling to go away."

"With everything ahead of us We left everything behind. But nothing that we needed; At least not at this time. And now the feeling that I’m feeling, Well it’s feeling like my life is finally mine. With nothing to go back to we just continue to drive."

"Well I’m just people watching The other people watching me. And we’re all people watching The other people watching we."

"And the water below gives a gift to the sky And the clouds give back every time they cry And make the grass grow green beneath my toes."

"When you’re so lonely lying in bed, Night’s closed it’s eyes but you can’t rest your head. Everyone’s sleeping all through the house, You wish you could dream but forgot to somehow. Sing this lullaby to yourself."

"You kill yourself and you make a big old sacrifice and try to get your revenge. That all you're gonna end up with is a paragraph in a newspaper. In the end, it does nothing. Nothing changes. The world goes on and you're gone. The best revenge is to live on and prove yourself."

"Well, maybe it was just that I wasn't going to like anybody because I had to work and I had to explain to my teachers why I wasn't keeping up. I'd fall asleep and things in class and they'd lecture me about the reality of their classroom. I said, 'You want to see my reality?' I opened up my backpack to where you usually keep your pencils. That's where I kept my bills... electric bills, rent... That was my reality."

"There is a thing that happens when you are not as privileged and you start hanging out with a seedier crowd because you can afford to do the same things, [...] And all of a sudden the big night out is sitting in somebody's trailer, smoking something or getting hold of something to put up to your nose."

"I am not a good enough writer to have an agenda or come up with a message and try to put it into a song, [...] It's more like you write what comes to you... You try to reflect the mood of the songs. Take 'Rearviewmirror', we start off with the music and it kinds of propels the lyrics. It made me feel like I was in a car, leaving something, a bad situation. There's an emotion there. I remembered all the times I wanted to leave..."

"You know, [his voice trembling, hoarse, no more than a whisper] I always thought I'd go first. I don't know why I thought that. It just seemed like I would. I mean, I didn't know him on a daily basis -- far from it. But, in a way, I don't even feel right being here without him. It's so difficult to really believe he's gone. I still talk about him like he's still here, you know. I can't figure it out. It doesn't make any sense. I remember when he got sick in Rome -- I didn't realize then that it was actually a suicide attempt -- I was in Seattle. I went out to grab something to eat and I saw the headlines. That he was in a coma. I just freaked out, man. I went home and made some phone calls, tried to find out what the fuck was going on. Then I started pacing the house and started to cry. I just kept saying, 'Don't go, man, just don't fuckin' go... just don't go.' I kept thinking, 'If he goes, I'm fucked.' You know, all these people man, all lining up to say that his death was so fucking inevitable... well, if it was inevitable for him, it's gonna be inevitable for me, too, if this continues. That's why this could be our last show in fuckin' forever as far as I'm concerned. Kurt's death has changed everything. I don't know if I can do it any more. See, people like him and me, we can't be real. It's a contradiction. We can't be these people who just write these real songs. We have to live up to the expectations of a million people. And we can't do that. And then there's a cynical fuckin' media on top of that. Fuck that, fuck 'em. All along the line, they question your fuckin' honesty. No matter what you say, no matter what you do, they think it's an angle. They think it's all a fuckin' game. Because that's all they're used to. That's what they think it is, a fuckin' game. They don't know what's real and what isn't. And when someone comes along who's trying to be real, they don't know the fuckin' difference. So if you say, 'No, I'm not playing your fuckin' game. I want out... I'm not doing this, I'm not doing that...,' they still think you're part of it. They just can't accept that you don't want to be part of it, that you were never part of it. They just think it's an angle. Some kind of fuckin' angle. And that makes it so hard for somebody who's just trying to be honest. So fuck it. And another thing, we never talked about this but it's like you were saying although we were very different people, there was probably a lot we had in common. We had similar backgrounds, yeah, things that happened with our families and shit... I think that's something that comes out in what we wrote in our songs, definitely. It is kinda similar sometimes. But what makes it more similar is the way people responded to what we wrote and sang about, the intense identification. And I think it was maybe a shock to both of us that so many people were going through the same things. I mean, they understood so completely what we were talking about. And this was shit we thought only he and I were ever gonna have to deal with. Because we kinda wrote these songs for ourselves really. Then all of a sudden, there's all these other people who connect with them and you're suddenly the spokesman for a fuckin' generation. Can you imagine that! A... spokesman... for a... generation."

"There was a lot of stuff that got said, but none of it really matters. And I like to think he may have had second thoughts about some of the things he said, you know... I mean there's a person we both knew, who told me that Kurt asked about me a lot, like picked their brains about me, this person who knew us both. And I thought that was cool. That made me feel good, you know. Because so much bullshit was getting written about us. And we talked, we talked a couple of times. And this one time, he told me flat-out, just delivered me a whole paragraph on the respect he had for what I did, and he realized it was pure. This was at the MTV Awards. 'Tears in Heaven' was playing in the background, we were slow dancing. I remember going out surfing the next morning and remembering how good that moment felt and thinking, 'Fuck, man, if only we hadn't been so afraid of each other...' Because we were going through so much of the same shit. If only we'd talked, maybe we could have helped each other."

"Allan Jones: When Kurt went into a coma in Rome, a local Seattle magazine, a small-circulation coffee house rag, carried an article with the headline: "WHY COULDN'T IT HAVE BEEN EDDIE VEDDER?" This was exactly what Courtney Love had told Select magazine, I tell Eddie. He looks absolutely stunned. "Oh," he says, the wind gone out of him, utterly deflated. "That's nice. That's really nice. That makes me feel really good. I wonder why she didn't mention that when I phoned her last night and offered her any help or support I could give her... I really don't know any of these people. I don't know Courtney, I'd never talked to her before. But someone said I should call her and I thought maybe I should. I mean, all this shit that comes up and all this bullshit that flies back and forth in the press that gets italicized and trumped up to make it a bigger deal than it really is, when all that's said and done, there's feelings I have for those people. And the ones that are alive, I need to let them know how I feel."

"{{cite web"

"I tell you, man, when our first record came out, I was shocked how many people related to some of that stuff. Something like 'Alive,' so many people dealt with death through that song. Like people dealt with the death of love through 'Black' and so many people dealt with suicide through 'Jeremy.' The kind of letters that got through to me about those songs, some of them were just frightening. It's just so fuckin' weird. You write about this shit, and you're suddenly the spokesman for a fuckin' generation," he laughs, and it's a bitter, scary laugh, nothing funny about it at all. "Think about it, man," he says. "Any generation that would pick Kurt [Cobain] or me as its spokesman -- that must be a pretty fucked up generation, don't you think? I mean, that generation must be really fucked up, man, really fuckin' fucked up...""

"Let me be as weird as I fuckin' like. It's my fuckin' life."

"Vedder has a variety of comments about God and/or belief, at one point he was saying, "When you're out in the desert, you can't believe the amount of stars. We've sent mechanisms out there, and they haven't found anything. They've found different colours of sand, and rings, and gasses, but nobody's shown me anything that makes me feel secure in what happens afterwards. All I really believe in is this moment, like right now.""

"JG: Can I ask what your feelings are about God?"

""Later he tried to keep a straight face as he mockingly confessed: 'While we were away, I found God.' He rambled on about the Bible before concluding, 'We found God. He was right in our stomachs...'" (The rambling had to do with finding a Bible in every hotel room, "Every hotel has Holy Bibles.")"

"I really like Chris Cornell]'s records and I think he's the best singer that we've got on the planet. I first met Chris when I moved to Seattle, and we started hanging around. I didn't know what musicians did with their life, and I quickly realized that what he did on a Friday night was to get a 12-pack of shitty beer and chase his dog around on the mud for four hours in the forest. That was about an exciting an epiphany as I had! I haven't seen him in town for a while, but I have taken over the whole dog-chasing practice – me and my Hawaiian mutt. The beer's gotten slightly better too."

"It was during that same week that I was up there [In Seattle rehearsing with Pearl Jam]. Day four maybe, or day five, they did a Temple [of the Dog] rehearsal after our afternoon rehearsal. I got to watch these songs, and watch how Chris [Cornell] was working, and watch Matt [Cameron] play drums. It got to "Hunger Strike" - I was sitting in the corner, putting duck tape on a little African drum. About two-thirds of the way though, he was having to cut off the one line, and start the other. I'm not now, and certainly wasn't then, self-assured or cocky, but I could hear what he was trying to do, so I walked up to the mic - which I'm really surprised I did - and sang the other part, "Going hungry, going hungry." The next time I was up, he asked if I'd record it - so it was just me and Chris in the same studio that we made [1991's] Ten record. I really like hearing that song. I feel like I could be real proud of it - because one, I didn't write it, and two, it was such a nice way to be ushered onto vinyl for the first time. I'm indebted to Chris time eternal for being invited onto that track."

"One of the first people I met outside of the group [Pearl Jam] was this next human and I had no idea how he would affect my life and my views on music and my views on friendship and what a big impact he would have. These guys [the other members of Pearl Jam] know him much longer than me and his impact is profound. I'd like to introduce with great pleasure my old neighbor, Chris Cornell."

"Sometimes it's hard to concentrate these days. I was thinking about the history of this building [Eventim Apollo] and the Bowie history. So I started to think about that and my mind began to wander. It's not a good...So I haven't really been talking about some things and I kind of... now it feels like it's conspicuous because I lost a really close friend of mine, somebody who...I'll say this too, I grew up as 4 boys, 4 brothers, and I lost my brother 2 years ago tragically like that in an accident and after that and losing a few other people, I'm not good at it, meaning I'm not...I have not been willing to accept the reality and that's just how I'm dealing with it (applause starts). No, no, no, no. So I want to be there for the family, be there for the community, be there for my brothers in my band, certainly the brothers in his band. But these things will take time but my friend is going to be gone forever and I will just have to...These things take time and I just want to send this out to everyone who was affected by it and they all back home and here appreciate it so deeply the support and the good thoughts of a man who was a... you know he wasn't just a friend he was someone I looked up to like my older brother. About two days after the news, I think it was the second night we were sleeping in this little cabin near the water, a place he would've loved. And all these memories started coming in about 1:30am like woke me up. Like big memories, memories I would think about all the time. Like the memories were big muscles. And then I couldn't stop the memories. And trying to sleep it was like if the neighbors had the music playing and you couldn't stop it. But then it was fine because then it got into little memories. It just kept going and going and going. And I realized how lucky I was to have hours worth of...you know if each of these memories was quick and I had hours of them. How fortunate was I?! And I didn't want to be sad, wanted to be grateful not sad. I'm still thinking about those memories and I will live with these memories in my heart and I will...love him forever."

"If you don't eat for a long time, food tastes better. The song ["In Hiding"] was about taking a fast from life, doing anything to get yourself back in touch with something real. Abstinence from anything is cool, because the normalcy of life is deceptive: It's enjoyable for a while, and there are good moments, but sometimes that's not enough. You start questioning what's the point. By not opening my mouth I was able to get into that state. Jack called me at the end of it; he couldn't understand what I was saying. It took a minute to get my speech back."

"That song is all about someone who's drunk with technology, who thinks they're the controlling living being on this planet. It's another one I'm not singing as myself.""

"A 20-page cardboard book with a line on each page and a picture to go with it. It's a fable, that's all. The music almost gives you this feeling of flight, and I really love singing the part at the end, which is about rising above anybody's comments about what you do and still giving your love away. You know -- not becoming bitter and reclusive, not condemning the whole world because of the actions of a few."

"It's about first relationships. The song is about letting go. It’s very rare for a relationship to withstand the Earth’s gravitational pull and where it’s going to take people and how they’re going to grow. I’ve heard it said that you can’t really have a true love unless it was a love unrequited. It’s a harsh one, because then your truest one is the one you can’t have forever."

"Reclamation by Eddie Vedder"

"Glasgow, Scotland. It's cold outside. I'm thinking about a problem. One group of people trying to force their beliefs on others, based on religion. And it seems as though we're regressing."

"Above, a helicopter flies by. If it continues on its course, it will shortly be over Ireland, where as of this writing, the powers that be are deciding if a 14-year-old girl who was raped by the father of one of her friends should be allowed to leave for Britain to obtain an abortion. She's been ordered not to leave the country for nine months. Fourteen years old. Raped. The issue of an unborn fetus takes on more importance than the fact that the rapist walks free."

"Extreme, but this is a place where the church influences the government. And when I think of the movements concerning abortion in the United States, it definitely seems as though we're regressing."

"My body's nobody's body but mine... You run your own body, let me run mine."

"At the University of San Diego a few years ago, pro-lifers gathered, while pro-choicers chanted the above. Sides clashed and tension ran high. A banner equating pro-choice ideology with Nazism and Hitler was displayed. "Baby Killers," a little red stop sign said -- a sign held by a well-dressed 3-year-old who sat atop the shoulders of his upper-middle class father. The kid looked confused and frightened. The ominous presence of armed police on horseback would be enough to upset anyone."

"And I wondered how this child got pulled into this? I wondered how any of us got pulled into this. The fact is that those people handing down decisions on the abortion issue are not the ones who will have to live or die by it."

"Ten years old. That's the age my child would have been. And I would not be here in Glasgow. I wouldn't be in this band or traveling. And I wouldn't have seen the liberal ways in which other countries we have visited deal with this issue. I wouldn't have been asked to write this piece. The fact that I've been through it on all levels is the only reason I accepted."

"Perhaps I'll have a child in the future, when I can provide properly. Who knows. But as individuals in this "free" country, we must have the right to choose when that time is right. A couple -- perhaps 15 or 16 years old, maybe 10 years older -- is faced with an unwanted pregnancy; it makes no difference if there is no means of support. They're questioning whether they can provide a proper climate in which to raise a child. A healthy question for both them and society itself. Yeah, there are programs to assist. Welfare and health programs that are constant victims of cutbacks. The child can sit in severely overcrowded classrooms and be taught by underpaid teachers."

"A right to a healthy future should be the consideration."

"Operation Rescue? The point being the rescue of a nonentity, a zygote. Perhaps the rescue of a young woman in crisis would be more in order. Instead, combat lines are drawn at clinics, and women must be escorted through trenches, which only adds to their trauma. This is not a game. This is not a religious pep rally. This is a woman's future. Roe vs. Wade was decided 19 years ago and the fact that a well-organized group has come close to overturning it is raw proof that we do live in a democracy. But also the reason that any opposition must be equally as vocal. You go to school in Normal, Illinois? Collegetown, U.S.A.? Shout it out. There are people wary of the strength that young voters possess. Prove them right. Decide on the issues and vote -- male or female -- for this is not just a women's issue. It's human rights. If it were a man's body and it was his destiny we were deciding there would be no issue. Not in today's male dominated society."

"When we started rehearsing the songs, I had pulled out "Hunger Strike" and I had this feeling it was just kind of gonna be filler, it didn't feel like a real song. Eddie was sitting there kind of waiting for a Mookie Blaylock rehearsal and I was singing parts, and he kind of humbly—but with some balls—walked up to the mic and started singing the low parts for me because he saw it was kind of hard. We got through a couple choruses of him doing that and suddenly the light bulb came on in my head, this guy's voice is amazing for these low parts. History wrote itself after that, that became the single."

"To the wisest and goofiest guy I know - thank you for helping raise me and for bringing two of my beautiful sisters into the world with mama J [Jill Vedder]! (this is us at @theohanafest, one of my favorite moments of 2019."

"I'm not a drummer anymore. On my gravestone, if there is one, if anyone writes anything about me besides hopefully being a dad, it would be that I sang in my band when I was in my 20s. So I was like, "Yeah, I should probably focus on this a little more," so I just practiced a lot."

"What you want if you're asking that question is a specific time in your life to come back to you, and that will never happen. You will never be 15 years old again. I could write, verbatim, another Take This To Your Grave, and you won't feel the same way. It's not going to mean anything to you because it wouldn't mean anything to me."

"Sometimes people associate getting big with selling out, which is funny because that's not something you necessarily have choice in. That's not a matter that is entirely up to you and at the same time, who hasn't sold out? If you've heard of a specific artist, they're big enough--they got to you. Where do you draw the line between what's big and what's too big?"

"I don't mind if someone thinks I'm a sell out. I go to bed happy knowing I do what I do and I'm not doing anything for reasons of money, and if I were trying to pick up chicks, I'm doing a horrible job. And if I wanted to drive awesome cars, I'm doing a really bad job there too."

"If you're trying to get a lot of money and attention and cars and just stuff like that, being in a band is a really bad way to do it, because it takes a lot of work, it's constant work, it's very grueling, and you don't really have time to spend money. So that would probably not even make my top 10 list of ways to make a lot of money, because records aren't selling anymore. The richest musician in America still doesn't even come close to a mid-level athlete."

"I've heard a lot of really awful, negative things said about Pete, and it's like, “Dude, you don't even have a clue how honest and real that guy is” for the amount of crap that people talk about him. Pete said it, and it's true, they make you into a wrestling character. And it's also like reality TV editing. It's really easy to cut somebody in rolling their eyes when that might not have even happened next to the thing that it's being shown next to."

"There was a weird moment where—I was still a drummer, I always saw myself as a drummer—and we got nominated for a Grammy, that was really crazy, and I was sitting there and Stevie Wonder was on stage and I remember thinking "Wow, I really need to take [singing] more seriously!""

"There's something really personal about your voice, where if people talk shit on your guitar, "Ugh, he played out of tune," etc., you can, in your head, blame it on something else, but when you fuck up with your singing, that's part of you [...] So I guess I'm an insecure enough dude that I just went back and really studied and tried to sing better."

"Pete's my best friend, I was the best man at his wedding, I love that man to death. I'd take a bullet for him."

"There's so many accusations that are so ridiculous about Pete Wentz that are taken as the gospel—people just assume that he posted pictures of his penis on the internet. That is the stupidest fucking thing thing I've ever heard. Why on earth would you ever do that?"

"I think Joe's underappreciated, I think Andy's underappreciated, I think Pete's underappreciated, I don't think people know how good he is. I think Neal [Avron]'s underappreciated, but if anything, I feel overappreciated. I think Patrick Stump gets enough attention."

"I collect movies, I still buy records constantly. I collect musical instruments and most of my time I spend making music, it's pretty much what I do 90% of the time I'm home. Aside from just normal stuff, I walk the dog, I hang out with my girlfriend, get dinner. Pretty mellow stuff."

"Right now I'm in Hollywood— I don't like Hollywood, it's not really my style. But I've found my own little niche here where it's not bad. It's one of those things where I've been on an extended work trip here for 2 years. I still technically live in Chicago and I'm dying to get back. That's one of the big things for me, I go back to Chicago when I want to hang out. I'm weirdly very proud of my city, and I hope, God willing, I die there."

"I think a producer should be like water, and whatever the shape of the glass is, he or she should fill that. If they need you to be the engineer guy--typically I have an engineer--I work at that stuff. If they need you to be a songwriting help guy, I work on that. If they need you to be a vocal melody guy, I work at that, etc. I kind of look at whatever a band needs out of me then I try to give it to them."

"I think one of the things if you look at minimalism or expressionism, there's various movements in modern composition that I think you can see really natural relations in pop music, so I mean I always look to that in pop music."

"Reich and John Cage were pretty big influences on this record (Folie A Deux) in weird ways in that you wouldn't necessarily hear any of it - nothing ends up sounding like either of them, but I think just methodology and things like that ended up on the record in various ways."

"I hear all sorts of things slung at us, one of my favorites being the "boy-band" accusation. I'm like, 'Boy band? I'm fat! If we were a boy band, I'd look good, I'd dance and I'd be charming - so what the fuck are you talking about?' I write songs, that's all I do."

"I get really annoyed with photo shoots and interviews and handshakes. I’m a musician; God forbid I actually have time to make music."

"He's not cocky because of Fall Out Boy, he's cocky because he's Pete Wentz."

"Quiet IS the new loud."

"Yeah, I've been writing a bunch of new stuff, but it's all secret. In fact, I may or may not have been writing stuff this entire interview."

"Whoever is in charge of my Wikipedia, all right, whoever you are - the major, most egregious thing in there isn't that, you know, apparently I'm bisexual and have like, twenty kids and that I learned everything I know from a sixteen-year-old who probably wrote that in himself, but the most egregious of all the errors is that it says I am a massive David Bowie fan, which is true, but it is a gross omission to leave out my obsession with Prince. Absolutely. So whoever you are, throw that in there. Go for it. You know what? Make me eighty feet tall. And, you know, make me a transsexual. But put in Prince."

"Joe Trohman: (referring to Pete and Patrick) You guys should just make lo- You guys should get married. Patrick: We are."

"Pete Wentz: Every action movie has to have a gadget guy. You hate being the gadget guy, huh? You're a good gadget guy, you wear glasses. Patrick: (throws glasses on the floor) Now I'm a HORRIBLE gadget guy!"

"We're standing outside of Peet's Coffee. I've never been here before, but I'm gonna pretend like I have. I love you, Peet's. So good memories."

"I did my civic duty. Haha I'm driving a Civic! Whoa!"

"(Points to guide arrows on street) See these guide arrows? Fuck you, guide arrows! Tell me to go that way? Fuck you."

"Nintendo DS makes me forget that I don't have any friends."

"Patrick: One of my favorite rumors about myself is that I am 31, which is just about 10 years off, so... Pete: He's 41, you motherfuckers."

"I hate barbeque sauce. Little known fact about me. Can't stand it."

"Before lunch, and ultimately recess, I need you to know - you're going to die."

"Carpool to save gas. 'Cause I know you're in grade school and driving is like, what you do."

"I'm sure it's gotta be a great job 'cause rock stars are known for their punctuality and politeness, so..."

"Yeah, I'm one of those guys--I'm either totally on time and--and everything's good, or I just--I just didn't know what happened, you know, and I just totally don't show up. Like not like late, like, I didn't know--my problem is that sometimes I'm real bad at getting information and retaining it, so...I dunno...Sometimes it's more forgetting than late."

"Don't just look at her ass, eat it."

"Calm before the storm - fuck it; MEOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOW. MEOW."

"Hey, does your mother sew? BOOM! Get her to sew that."

"Come to think of it, I'm gonna- I'm gonna make him bald, and make him- and make him sweat acid. And I think I'm gonna give him weird bladder problems, and romantic problems..Y'know what?! THE WHOLE THING!"

"Know somethin'... I got a range. I got a range like no motherfucker knows."

"I already said that fucking thing, you missed it. Where were you on that one, O'Keefe? Eyes on the prize. Focus!"

"My badge my witn- oh shh... *hums* Pete:*makes weird noise* oh shhh!"

"Woah! Nope... *screams* Boo..."

"What's so funny about I don't get it..."

"I mean you never heard of the menlinium falcon is the shit, but made the Kessel Run in and under 12 parsecs"

"Hi I'm Patrick. Today we're going to look at how long it takes for spilt Coke to sink into a carpet. [plays Jeopardy music] Note that it's still fizzy."

"I'm probably the only guy in the world that likes to eat black licorice."

"Hi, I'm Patrick Stump. And I'm wearing Pete's pants."

"These are the dude version. They couldn't possibly be your pants!"

"Everything was plugged in and should’ve been working, but it gave me a communication error. I got like a cave man and got so mad at it. I was completely fed up. I’m not an engineer, I’m not a computer whiz. I don’t know anything about electronics. All I know is that I want this thing to make noise, I want to write music, and it’s not working."

"I mean, if I had a piccolo in front of me I would probably figure out how to play ‘Hot Cross Buns’ or something."

"I don't know, we played a show for like, ten kids, but those ten kids were just insane. It's really quantity, not quality, and that's what I really -- (Pete cuts him off) Pete: It's quality, not quantity. You said it backwards. I don't want you to look like a dumbass... on film."

"This one's for all the homies who couldn't make it to the party!"

"We're meant for each other 'cause we smell bad."

"There are some things in life that make you happy, and make you like your life. Then there are some things in life that you witness, that make you not like your life as much. I think that's one of them. I'm sorry, Juan."

"I started playing music when I was really young. I didn't start off on guitar because I couldn't fit my hands around the neck and fret board. So I did the drums. And back then, all I did was hit things."

"I used to work in a record store. I'm kind of a record nerd."

"Fall Out Boy are a lot more influenced by pop these days, but no matter the era, Patrick Stump has always possessed an inimitable style. Influenced by the Get Up Kids and Saves the Day, he uses his soulful, gigantic voice to increase the drama and atmosphere, which is aided by Pete Wentz’s evocative lyricism. It all adds an abundance of swagger, personality, and theatricality to his impressive vocal runs."

"Stump’s belts are as iconic as the band’s biblically long song titles."

"What's the last thing a drummer says in a band?"

""Hey guys, why don't we try one of my songs?"

"Masturbation is one of the safest ways to explore your own sexuality."

"Rock stars suck. Man, I'd be so embarrassed at being called a rock star. A lot of those connotations aren't conductive to my lifestyle. I don't do drugs, I don't fuck groupies, I don't spend all my money on limos and mansions and cocaine. I have a car and a small house and I go on tour and go to bed early and wake up and have tea. I'm a worker, man. I don't think many people see me as a rock star; hopefully they see me as a normal person. 'Musician' would be just fine."

"I still dream about Kurt. Every time I see him in a dream, I’ll be amazed and I get this feeling that everyone else thinks he’s dead. It always feels totally real, probably because I’m a very vivid dreamer. But, in my dreams, Kurt’s usually been hiding - we’ll get together and I’ll end up asking him, ‘God, where have you been?’"

"One thing I did before Nirvana became popular was I stopped doing drugs."

"Perez [Hilton]: Are you drunk right now? Grohl: No, I gotta play. Perez: Britney Spears has been getting wasted all the time, hasn't stopped her. Grohl: Yeah, but she doesn't have to sing live."

"Around the time that I recorded the first Foo Fighters tape, I was reading a lot of books on UFO’s. … So, since I had recorded the first record by myself, playing all the instruments, but I wanted people to think that it was a group, I figured that FOO FIGHTERS - WW2 term for UFO’s - might lead people to believe that it was more than just one guy. Silly, huh? Had I actually considered this to be a career, I probably would have called it something else, because it’s the stupidest fucking band name in the world."

"I'd like to imagine I won't end up in hell, but I think I've done too much acid and listened to too much death metal to sit on a cloud next to God with angels floating above my head."

"He did his best to make his riff ideas catchy and rhythmic."

"Why doesn't Dave Grohl run for President? I think he'd be good, he seems a very organised man. He has about 12 fingers in about 50 pies, and they're all great pies, and great fingers. What I'm saying is that we really respect that band, and I fucking love him!"

"I love his voice (Dave) and the song writing is scary; it's phenomenal. He's the most inspirational guy out there for me now."

"The Power. If anyone deserves to battle Animal from The Muppets on the drums, it’s Dave Grohl. In my younger years, it was the coolest thing in the world to be a hard hitter and I drew constant inspiration from not only Dave’s aggressive hitting, but his choice of unique grooves and fills, which twist your mind yet remain spacious and serve the song. There’s no doubt he approaches his drum parts as a songwriter, and that may be the biggest thing I was able to take away from him."

"David Grohl is such a nice guy."

"If I had a hammer, I'd build a city on stilts so my feet would stay dry when God's wine glass tilts. If I had a shovel, I'd dig a hole in the dirt and I'll be hiding when his drunken stupor lands upon earth"

"I think we're all a bunch of weirdos on a quest to belong. The songs are echolocation up in impregnable fog. That's why it's odd to see a pile of imperfections and flaws ascend a pedestal to patronize the rest of the cogs."

"Life's not a bitch, life is a beautiful woman, You only call her a bitch 'cause she won't let you get that pussy, Maybe she didn't feel y'all shared any similar interests, Or maybe you're just an asshole who couldn't sweet-talk the princess,"

"Music to me is spontaneous, writing is spontaneous and it's all based on not trying to do it. From beginning to end, whether it's writing a song, or playing guitar, or a particular chord sequence, or blowing a horn, it's based on improvisation and spontaneity."

"Where I feel this has cost me is in the personality situation, where you're expected to be a personality. You not only have to write and record, but you have to go out and sell it. Well, I'm not a salesman, and I'm very bad at selling things. If I had to do that for a living, I'd probably be completely broke. I can't sell myself. And I don't even want to. That's something that's not going to change."

"Someone once described me as a maverick and that's what I would say. I'm a maverick not by choice but by conviction."

"Like I say, the way I write songs is, you know, inspirational. I have to wait for it to happen. And when it happens I get lines, and I just write them down, you know. I'm not sort of a Tin Pan Alley sort of songwriter. I just sort of write down what I get - without censoring or questioning what it is and what it means, you know. Like later on I look at what it means, but not at the time."

"Music is spiritual. The music business is not."

"With Moondance, I wrote the melody first. I played the melody on a soprano sax and I knew I had a song so I wrote lyrics to go with the melody. That's the way I wrote that one. I don't really have any words to particularly describe the song, sophisticated is probably the word I'm looking for. For me, Moondance is a sophisticated song. Frank Sinatra wouldn't be out of place singing that."

"Into the Music was about the first album where I felt, 'I'm starting here'...the Wavelength thing, I didn't really feel that was me."

"The odd time something happens and you go into some kind of enchantment (on stage). But you have to work very hard to get that. Most of the time you're just playing and singing the songs, and there's no guarantee that you are going to get anywhere...."

"When I started studying tenor saxophone as a kid in Belfast, I did so with a guy named George Cassidy, who was also a big inspiration"

"When I was fifteen, I became a professional musician. I got involved with people and did certain things which led me to start making records and touring. And leaving Belfast and going to London and America, one thing led to another and I got caught up in the life that I'm living now...I was very young and i followed something. (1993)"

"There is one thing I don't understand about Astral Weeks. Of all the records I have ever made that one is definitely not rock. You could throw that record at the wall, take it to music colleges, analyze it to death. Nobody is going to tell me that it is a rock album. Why they keep calling it one I have no idea."

"People think I'm eccentric, cranky. If I'm eccentric because I've never been into mainstream things, then I am eccentric."

"I've never been comfortable working live, and I'm still not. I was always more music-oriented and less star-oriented, which is why I've never been comfortable on big stages in big halls."

"The people I was listening to never sold a lot of records. John Lee Hooker was never on the charts, so I was never in it from a commercial point of view. Other people expected things from my records, but I never did."

"I don't think I will ever mellow out. I think if you mellow out, you get eaten up. You become like a commodity. So I don't think I will mellow out. It is not in my blood."

"Hey where did we go, Days when the rains came Down in the hollow, Playin' a new game, Laughing and a running hey, hey Skipping and a jumping In the misty morning fog with Our hearts a thumpin' and you My brown eyed girl, You my brown eyed girl."

"So hard to find my way, Now that I'm all on my own. I saw you just the other day, My how you have grown, Cast my memory back there, Lord Sometimes I'm overcome thinking 'bout Making love in the green grass Behind the stadium with you My brown eyed girl You my brown eyed girl."

"If I ventured in the slipstream, Between the viaducts of your dream, Where immobile steel rims crack, And the ditch in the back roads stop, Could you find me? Would you kiss my eyes? To lay me down, In silence easy, To be born again. To be born again."

"Got a home on high Ain't nothing but a stranger in this world I'm nothing but a stranger in this world I got a home on high In another land So far away."

"Way over on the railroad, Tomorrow all the tipping trucks will unload together, Every scrapbook stuck with glue, And I'll stand beside you, Beside you, child."

"The dynamo of your smile caressed a barefoot virgin child to wander."

"And I shall drive my chariot Down your streets and cry 'Hey, it's me, I'm dynamite And I don't know why' We shall walk and talk In gardens all misty wet with rain And I will never, never, never Grow so old again"

"Yonder comes my lady Rainbow ribbons in her hair Yonder comes my lady Rainbow ribbons in her hair Six white horses and a carriage She's returning from the fair"

"And you know you gotta go On that train from Dublin up to Sandy Row Throwing pennies at the bridges down below And the rain, hail, sleet, and snow Say goodbye to Madame George Dry your eye for Madame George Wonder why for Madame George"

"And this time I forget to slip into your slumber The light is on the left side of your head And I'm standing in your doorway And I'm mumbling and I can't remember the last thing that ran through my head"

"Saw you early this morning With your brand new boy and your Cadillac Saw you early this morning With your brand new boy and your Cadillac You're gone for something And I know you won't be back"

"Well it's a marvelous night for a moondance, With the stars up above in your eyes. A fantabulous night to make romance, 'Neath the cover of October skies. And all the leaves on the trees are falling To the sound of the breezes that blow. And I'm trying to please to the calling Of your heart-strings that play soft and low. And all the night's magic seems to whisper and hush, And all the soft moonlight seems to shine in your blush.Can I just have one more moondance with you, my love? Can I just make some more romance with you, my love?"

"I can hear her heart beat from a thousand miles And the heavens open every time she smiles And when I come to her that's where I belong Yet I'm running to her like a river's song."

"Turn up your radio and let me hear the song Switch on your electric light Then we can get down to what is really wrong I long to hold you tight so I can feel you Sweet lady of the night I shall reveal you."

"And it stoned me to my soul Stoned me just like Jelly Roll And it stoned me And it stoned me to my soul Stoned me just like goin' home. And it stoned me."

"Hark, now hear the sailors cry, Smell the sea and feel the sky. Let your soul and spirit fly into the mystic."

"And when that foghorn blows, I will be coming home, When that foghorn blows, I wanna hear it, I don't have to fear it, And I wanna rock your gypsy soul, Just like way back in the days of old, And magnificently we will fold Into the mystic."

"My back was up against the wall And you slowly just walked away You never really heard my call When I cried out that way With my face against the sun You pointed out for me to go Then you said I was the one Had to reap what you did sow."

"When all the dark clouds roll away And the sun begins to shine I see my freedom from across the way And it comes right in on time Well it shines so bright and it gives so much light And it comes from the sky above Makes me feel so free makes me feel like me And lights my life with love."

"I was lost and double crossed, With my hands behind my back. I was longtime hurt and thrown in the dirt, Shoved out on the railroad track. I've been used, abused and so confused, And I had nowhere to run. But I stood and looked, And my eyes got hooked On that beautiful morning sun."

"By the winding stream we shall lie and dream We'll make dreams come true if we want them to Yes all will come play the pipes and drum Sing a happy song and we'll sing along."

"And they'll talk to you while you're in trances And you'll visualize not taking any chances But meet them halfway with love, peace and persuasion And expect them to rise for the occasion."

"Don't want to discuss it, I think it's time for a change. You may get disgusted, some think that I'm strange In that case I'll go underground, get some heavy rest Never have to worry, about what is worst and what is best."

"Someone to hold onto And keep me from all fear Someone to be my guiding light And keep me ever dear To keep me from my selfishness To keep me from my sorrow To lead me on to givingness So I can see a new tomorrow."

"Why did you leave America? Why did you let me down? And now that things seem better off, Why do you come around? You know I just can't see you now In my new world crystal ball. You know I just can't free you now, That's not my job at all."

"And all the girls walk by Dressed up for each other And the boys do the boogie-woogie On the corner of the street And the people passin' by Just stare in wild wonder And the inside juke-box Roars out just like thunder."

"Waiting for the sun to shine And you know sometimes it gets so painful Just like talking to yourself When everything don't seem to have no rhyme or reason we all go Do do loo do do, do do loo do do Waiting for the sun to shine."

"Oh don't it get you Get you when you're through Feel the breezes blowing all around your coat Oh don't it get you When you gotta roam Hear the children singing My daddy's coming home"

"You can't stop us on the road to freedom You can't stop us 'cause our eyes can see Men with insight, men in granite Knights in armor intent on chivalry She's as sweet as Tupelo honey She's an angel of the first degree She's as sweet as Tupelo honey Just like honey, baby, from the bee"

"I'm in heaven, I'm in heaven I'm in heaven when you smile, when you smile."

"Laying underneath the stars Can be so much fun Especially when you're feeling good When you're with the one you love."

"And I shall search my soul, I shall search my very soul, For the lion, For the lion, For the lion, For the lion inside me."

"And we're sailing, we're sailing, Way up to Caledonia, We're from Denmark."

"Oh redwood tree, Please let us under, When we were young we used to go, Under the redwood tree, And it smelled like rain, Maybe even thunder, Won't you keep us from all harm, Wonderful redwood tree."

"Look at the ivy on the cold clinging wall Look at the flowers and the green grass so tall It's not a matter of when push comes to shove It's just an hour on the wings of a dove."

"Put your money where your mouth is Then we can get something going In order to win you must be prepared to lose sometime And leave one or two cards showing."

"Did you ever hear about the great deception? Well the plastic revolutionaries take the money and run. Have you ever been down to love city? Where they rip you off with a smile, And it don't take a gun."

"Leaves of brown they fall to the ground. And it's here, over there leaves around. Shut the door, dim the lights and relax. What is more, your desire or the facts?"

"Fair play to you, Kilarney's lakes are so blue, And the architecture I'm taking in with my mind, So fine."

"And there's only one man knows way to go, And we say 'Geronimo.'"

"Hi-ho, silver! Tit for tat! And I love you for that."

"Linden Arden stole the highlights With one hand tied behind his back. Loved the morning sun and whiskey Ran like water in his veins. Loved to go to church on Sunday, Even though he was a drinkin' man. When the boys came to San Francisco, They were looking for his life. But he found out where they were drinking, Met them face to face outside. Cleaved their heads off with a hatchet, Lord, he was a drinkin' man. And when somebody tried to get above him, He just took the law into his own hands. Linden Arden stole the highlights, And they put his fingers through the glass. He had heard all those stories many, many times before, And he did not care, nor know, to ask. And he loved the little children like they were his very own. You say 'Someday, he may get lonely, Now he's livin', livin' with a gun.'"

"When the ghost comes round at midnight Well you both can have some fun He can drive you mad, he can make you sad He can keep you from the sun When they take him down, he'll be both safe and sound And the hand does fit the glove And no matter what they tell you, There's good and evil in everyone."

"Come here my love And I will lift my spirits high for you I'd like to fly away and spend a day or two Just contemplating the fields and leaves and talking about nothing Just layin' down in shades of effervescent, effervescent odors And shades of time and tide."

"Well let them take you for a clown And they're bound to bring you down. You got to make it through the world if you can. Think they're doing you wrong But you got here on your own. You got to make it through the world if you can."

"In the land of a thousand dances, I dance with you. I was out I was taking my chances When dreams came true When you came into my dream Like from a whisper to a scream."

"And I shall get to know you In these lifetimes In awe and wonder On down through the years The nighttime angel spreads her wings around me I feel the silence And my doubts are cleared."

"To Santa Fe Do you need it? Can you feel it in the same old way? I can feel it from the mountain top Runnin' down to the foamy brine In a rest'rant 'cross a table top Looking into a glass of wine Whispering in the evening breeze Green leaves glist'ning eucalyptus trees Can you hear them? Or get near them?"

"Men saw the stars at the edge of the sea They thought great thoughts about liberty Poets wrote down words that did fit Writers wrote books Thinkers thought about it."

"From the dark end of the street To the bright side of the road We’ll be lovers once again on the Bright side of the road"

"Some people spend their time just runnin' round in circles Always chasing some exotic bird I prefer to spend some time just listening for that special something That I've never ever heard I like a new song to sing, another show or somewhere entirely different to be But baby you make me feel so free."

"Walkin' on a city street who would think you could ever be touched By a total stranger, not me But when you came up to me that day and I listened to your story It reminded me so much of myself It wasn't what you said but the way it felt to me About a search and a journey just like mine."

"When you hear the music ringin' in your soul And you feel it in your heart and it grows and grows And it comes from the backstreet rock & roll and the healing has begun I want you to put on your pretty summer dress You can wear your Easter bonnet and all the rest And I wanna make love to you yes, yes, yes and the healing has begun."

"You know what they're writing about Baby you know what they're writing about It's a thing called love down through the ages Makes you wanna cry sometimes Makes you feel like you wanna lay down and die sometimes Makes you high sometimes But when you really get in it lifts you right up."

"Beside the garden walls, We walk in haunts of ancient peace. At night we rest and go to sleep In haunts of ancient peace. The love and light we seek, The words we do not need to speak, Here in this wondrous way we keep These haunts of ancient peace."

"Open your arms in the early mornin' When the light comes shinin' through Can't you hear my heart beat just for you? It's beating so wild, honey. And light comes shinin' Singin' my song And the band is playin' And the music is tried and true."

"I have seen without perceiving I have been another man Let me pierce the realm of glamour So I know just what I am."

"What's my line? I'm happy cleaning windows Take my time I'll see you when my love grows Baby don't let it slide I'm a working man in my prime Cleaning windows..."

"Rave on, down through the industrial revolution Empiricism, atomic and nuclear age Rave on down through time and space down through the corridors Rave on words on printed page."

"Oh won't you stay Stay a while with your own ones Don't ever stray Stray so far from your own ones 'Cause the world is so cold Don't care nothing for your soul That you share with your own ones."

"Your street, rich street or poor Used to always be sure, on your street There's a place in your heart you know from the start Can't be complete outside of the street Keep moving on through the joy and the pain Sometimes you got to look back To the street again Would you prefer all those castles in Spain? Or the view of your street from your window pane?"

"Showed me pictures in the gallery Showed me novels on the shelf Put my hands across the table Gave me knowledge of myself. Showed me visions, showed me nightmares Gave me dreams that never end Showed me light out of the tunnel When there was darkness all around instead."

"I walked in my greatcoat Down through the days of the leaves. No before after, yes after before We were shining our light into the days of blooming wonder In the eternal presence, in the presence of the flame."

"There's an angel that's watching right over you All your trials have not been in vain Won't you lift your head up to the starry night Finding strength in the things that remain."

"When a man comes through He must do what he's supposed to do When a man comes through. He can't do what everyone expects him to."

"Got my ticket at the airport Well I guess I've been marking time I've been living in another country That operates along entirely different lines Keep me away from porter or whiskey Don't play anything sentimental it'll make me cry I've got to go back my friend Is there really any need to ask why?"

"No Guru, no method, no teacher Just you and I and nature And the Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost In the garden wet with rain."

"Thanks for the information Never give a sucker an even break When he's breaking through To a new level of consciousness There always seems to be more Obstacles in the way Thanks for the information I know It's only a combat zone Thanks for the memory, I'll just have To carry on on my own."

"When you come down From your Ivory Tower You will see how it really must be To be like me, to see like me, To feel like me."

"Let go into the mystery Let yourself go You've got to open up your heart That's all I know Trust what I say and do what you're told Baby, and all your dirt will turn Into gold."

"There's a dream where the contents are visible Where the poetic champions compose Will you breathe not a word of this secrecy, and Will you still be my special rose?"

"I forgot that love existed, troubled in my mind. Heartache after heartache, worried all the time. I forgot that love existed Then I saw the light Everyone around me make everything alright."

"I've been travellin' a hard road Baby lookin' for someone exactly like you I've been carryin' my heavy load Waiting for the light to come shining through Someone like you Make it all worth while Someone like you Make me satisfied Someone exactly like you."

"Well I've got to get out of the rat-race now I'm tired of the ways of mice and men And the empires all turning into rust again. Out of everything nothing remains the same That's why I'm cloud hidden Cloud hidden Whereabouts unknown."

"Won't you guide me through the dark night of the soul That I may better understand your way Let me be just and worthy to receive All the blessings of the Lord into my life."

"Sometimes, when the spirit moves me I can do many wondrous things I wanna know when the spirit moves you Did ye get healed?"

"Whenever God shines his light on me Opens up my eyes so I can see When I look up in the darkest night I know everything's going to be alright In deep confusion, in great despair When I reach out for him he is there When I am lonely as I can be I know that God shines his light on me."

"I'd love to write another song Baby especially for you I'd love to write another song And feel things bright and new In poetry I'd carve it well I'd even make it rhyme I'd love to write another song Just to get some peace of mind."

"Have I told you lately that I love you? Have I told you there's no one above you? Fill my heart with gladness, Take away my sadness, Ease my troubles, that's what you do."

"I look at the side of your face as the sunlight comes Streaming through the window in the autumn sunshine And all the time going to Coney Island I'm thinking, Wouldn't it be great if it was like this all the time."

"Ambition will take you And ride you too far and Conservatism bring you to boredom once more Sit down by the river And watch the stream flow Recall all the dreams That you once used to know The things you've forgotten That took you away To pastures not greener but meaner."

"Whatever it takes to fulfill his mission That is the way we must go But you've got to do it your own way Tear down the old, bring up the new."

"These are the days of the endless summer These are the days, the time is now There is no past, there's only future There's only here, there's only now. Oh your smiling face, your gracious presence The fires of spring are kindling bright And the radiant heart and the song of glory Crying freedom, freedom in the night"

"These are the days now that we must savour And we must enjoy as we can These are the days that will last forever You've got to hold them, hold them in your heart"

"Some people say You can make it on your own Oh you can make it if you try I know better now You can't stand up alone Oh baby that is why.I'm real real gone I can't stand up by myself Don't you know I need your help You're a friend of mine And I'm real real gone."

"Enlightenment says the world is nothing Nothing but a dream, everything's an illusion And nothing is real."

"The warm look of radiance on your face And your heart beating close to mine And the evening fading in the candle glow This must be what it's all about Oh this must be what it's all about This must be what paradise is like So quiet in here. So peaceful in here So quiet in here, yeah, so peaceful in here."

"The way you see me walking on That's why I'm telling you in song There's only one way to get ahead You've got to give it up instead Start all over again."

"Say que sera, whatever will be But then I keep on searching for immortality She's so beautiful but she's going to die some day Everything in life just passes away But, precious time is slipping away You know she's only queen for a day It doesn't matter to which God you pray"

"And it's a hard road, it's a hard road daddy-o When my job is turning lead into gold He was born in the back street, born in the back street jelly roll I'm on the road again and I'm searching for The philosophers stone Can you hear that engine Can you hear that engine drone Well I'm on the road again and I'm searching for..."

"I saw you standing with the wind and the rain in your face And you were thinking 'bout the wisdom of the leaves and their grace When the leaves come falling down In September when the leaves, come falling down Oh, the last time I saw Paris in the streets, in the rain And as I walk along the boulevards with you, once again And the leaves come falling down In September, when the leaves come falling down"

"Van Morrison is interested, obsessed with how much musical or verbal information he can compress into a small space, and, almost, conversely, how far he can spread one note, word, sound, or picture."

"They asked me to come to New York to help celebrate Van's induction into the Songwriter's Hall of Fame. I went because I see Van as one of the cats that has kept the faith. Like me, he's always himself — he stays true to the music that means the most to him. It meant a lot to sing "Crazy Love" on stage that evening."

"He extends himself only to express himself. Alone among rock's great figures — and even in that company he is one of the greatest — Morrison is adamantly inward. And unique. Although he freely crosses musical boundaries —R. and B., Celtic melodies, jazz, rave-up rock, hymns, down-and-dirty blues — he can unfailingly be found in the same strange place: on his own wavelength."

"I love Van Morrison because he always seems to be searching, never found. I don't know about his personal life but in his music he gives the listener only a question. The answer lies elsewhere to be attained someday."

"Van Morrison remains a singer who can be compared to no other in the history of modern popular music."

"Van Morrison should be friggin' canonized."

"My first impression of Van Morrison was that he was a terrific singer. No, I take that back. I thought he was a really dirty singer. Everything he did had a real big pair of balls to it."

"A great Irish poet"

"He has this great poetic and fantastic voice and what I love about Van, and what I forget to do sometimes is, well I can tell when Van is just like drifting into sort of a zone he just drifts into a place where the whole world is shut out and you can tell that he's in that spot. It's almost a dream-like, trance-like state, singing sometimes. That's really what music is all about. It's almost a jazz concept if you know what I mean — you just kinda go out and you're just wingin' it and I love that about Van, he will risk that, he will go on and on and on and he won't fade the ending before the magic happens, as it were."

"There was a definite charisma when Van performed. Van always had something about him. Whether you liked it or not, you could never take away from the fact that he was different from all other human beings, and here he is today, still being different."

"Morrison remains a singer who can be compared to no other performer in the history of rock 'n' roll, a singer who can not be pinned down, dismissed or fitted into anyone's expectations. He is a conundrum."

"I never really cared about achieving commercial success. As soon as I was signed to a record company, I felt like I made it because I was able to quit my day job. To me, success was just not having to have a boss and not having a day job. So I’ve been living my own version of success since the early ’90s when I first got signed and I haven’t had a job since then. I’m pretty happy about that. When I did have a little bit of commercial success, it really didn’t suit my temperament at all. I’m a terrible public person. I’m happier where I am now."

"A lot of so-called Christian souls are not fine. People need to look inside themselves and look at the lives they’re leading and fix themselves before they try to fix other people."

"The most rabidly religious people are the most rabidly evil."

"I am only human, I am weak. I want his power inside of me. And I'm not talking about a piece of meat. I'm saying something really deep."

"I'm a goddess in your eyes, and I will never die. I was born of people's needs, and what they don't wanna believe. But I am a liar, that's the truth, go home and think it through. That's the harm in mystery, all you know is what you see.I got no idols."

"What a life, you wear it like propriety What a life, you do it like you really mean it What a life, I watch it like a scary movie What a life, what a life, what a life."

"Beauty can be sad. You're proof of that. When the damage is done, you're damaged goods. That's not to say it's not okay. I wouldn't have it any other way.A heart, a heart that hurts, is a heart, a heart that works."

"Reach inside carefully. Feel my psyche. Make it last. Put this moment under glass."

"Love is everywhere I'm not allowed. I feel he's been to hell, but he's near to heaven now. I need to see it. I can't not have it, so inscrutable, so beautiful."

"This can't be real I've never seen so much This must be a joke.I don't know how to feel I haven't earned it yet Everything fades so fast."

"Okay I gotta go Maybe I don't want to know There's too much truth in this room."

"How do you get up in the morning? Another wasted life it's so boring The system never failed you You failed yourself and all of your friends Now your heart is failing too A total system failure they pronounce you"

"I showed you how to touch a star I helped you forget who you are Baby, you can drive my car Over to the right side of the tracksYou pushed your greatest chance away But still I really want to sayI forgive you."

"I never needed this I never needed anyone I meant every word that I said It's true I wasn't talking to you And I'm sorry that I must go so soon Please forgive me for finding something real and pure and trueSomebody is waiting for me"

"I've been sleeping through my life Now I'm waking up And I want to stand in the sunshine I have never been ecstatic Had a flower but it never bloomed In the darkness of my wasted youth It was hiding in the shadows Learning to become invisible Uncover me"

"Impossible to love Is all that I know how to be But in my heart I keep repeating You didn't mean to hate meI still love my enemy."

"Can you take it when I break it give it back to the posers who fake it Suck the milk out of the lilacs we were so innocent you can't go back What the fuck it's a miracle I’m even here You're over me but I’m alive so what do i care Standing in the cement"

"There's a hole in the sky I stood and stared I feel it inside what isn't there The children are lost we can't find them anywhere Hole in the sky I'm crying still crying for you."

"Hole in the sky I'm coming I’m coming with you."

"A Beer A Day Keeps The Doctor Away."

"For those who just tuned in we're the Beatles!"

"Every Australian band wants to stick it to the Yankees."

"Maybe if I point to my brain it will work."

"Buddy Holly was the geekiest looking guy in the world, but he had some really rockin tunes."

"Fuck, you see some weird looking people around here."

"The drug issue is hard to separate from a class issue, an education issue, a wonky foreign policy issue, and a race issue. What I do know is, be it caffeine, alcohol, cocaine, or adrenaline, let's face it: people like to get high. From Starbucks to Budweiser to your own brain, everybody's a pusher these days. If I could substitute another drug to be consumed in the country as much as alcohol is, it would be helium from children's birthday party balloons. Try not laughing when someone sounds like a chipmunk!"

"I always looked at any instrument as just a tool, an expressive voice to write with. It even differs from guitar to guitar. Some guitars demand that you play them delicately and really respect the instrument, and some beg to be abused. Same with piano. I know with guitar, I'm intimate with it enough to know when I put my fingers here, it will sound like this. I prefer writing on piano because it's always a surprise."

"A lot of the songs have a duality about them; one part is totally sincere, and there's another part that is kind of smirking and making light of it all. Or there's a very dark streak about it."

"I like the material, which makes it easy to sort of delve into it, and then also I was too tired to be nervous. I was just happy. The anxiety, the anxious energy was not there, because I was too exhausted."

"I love the idea that something would be whimsical, and like "delightful", you know, but also disgusting — so I like this sort of, you know, a really gnarly guitar — really gross, disgusting guitar and then a — really a whimsical... — it's one of those things you can only describe in sort of awkward hand gestures and eye motions. Imagine!"

"I think anyone who is creative or self-aware in any way, there’s like a humility to it, or I should say a humiliation to it. But there’s also a self-delusion — the provisional ego, as my uncle would call it. The self-delusion is the thing that makes you go, oh you know what, all the music that I’ve ever loved in the world, I want to be a part of that — hey, listen to what I have to say, it’s really important, it’s going to matter.” You can’t apologize your way into people’s hearts ... You have to go full force."

"Leaden trumpets spit the soot of power they say "I'm on your side when nobody is, cause nobody is. Come sit right here and sleep while I slip poison in your ear""

"We are waiting on a telegram to give us news of the fall I am sorry to report dear Paris is burning after all We have taken to the streets in open rejoice revolting We are dancing a black waltz — fair Paris is burning after all."

"Sticks and stones have made me smarter it's words that cut me under my armor they say..."

"What me worry? I never do I'm always amused and amusing you"

"What me worry? I never do. Life is one charming ruse for us lucky few.Have I fooled you, dear? The time is coming near when I'll give you my hand and I'll say, "It's been grand, but... I'm out of here I'm out of here""

"The first thing I did when I picked up any instrument, when I was five years old, was write a song. It's kind of funny; I thought about it, statements that it's a "solo effort" — it's kind of like, "Oh, well I've been doing this since I was five." I was kind of doing this before I did anything else."

"I was recording with The Polyphonic Spree, recording The Fragile Army, and we were holed up in January in Minnesota at our studio. They called Mike in to play, and we just hit it off, in a really, really special way. Actually, the night after meeting and having a conversation with him, I sat down and I wrote "All My Stars Aligned". And I just kind of had an idea, "Wouldn't it be amazing if Mike Garson played? So the guy who played solo in Aladdin Sane, wouldn't it be amazing if this guy played this song?" And I wrote it, based on a conversation we had, but I didn't want to ask him, because I felt shy, and nervous, and everything. It was a few months later, actually, we kind of got in touch, and, 'Oh, what are you doing?', and I sent him a couple songs that I was working on. I sent him "Your Lips Are Red" and I sent him "All My Stars Aligned", just to show, you know, 'wink-wink, hint-hint, this is what I'm doing.' And he wrote me back, the things that we'd said, and asked to play on the record. So I was, 'Well, okay, if you insist…' That worked out pretty miraculously."

"I enjoyed, and I tried to soak up and learn everything as fast as I could from doing any kind of music. It's good to have a gig. If you're a musician, it's good to be working. I love doing all of it, but Marry Me is my baby, St. Vincent is my child."

"In a really great way, you simultaneously try to take up as little and as much space as possible."

"Some songs I wrote that night, and some songs took nine months to arrange, get how I positioned them. Some songs I wrote parts of when I was twelve, thirteen, fourteen, fifteen… Just putting it together, just finding the right place for it. So it's really been a long time coming. ... I'm actually really restless, in the sense that I'd rather be always making something new. I'm really excited about making a second record. I've got a lot of things up my sleeve, I guess."

"I certainly owe a lot of awesomeness to blogs, to people who have been blogging about a show, or blogging about a single, or blogging about something. It's just amazing to me that it seems to be a nice equalizer. People don't necessarily need the clout of a big "record company machine" to put their face on a billboard. It seems more organic and honest in a lot of ways, for fans of music to be critics I suppose."

"I'm a debut artist, I'm not established — nobody would write about it if they didn't like it. So I'm waiting for the next album for the backlash."

"Here's an awesome tour story: I was playing these two shows last fall in Europe, we played at Reykjavík, and the three or four days we were in Reykjavík happened to be the one and only Sugarcubes reunion show… So it was like, tour of a lifetime."

"I'm not your mother's favorite dog I'm not the carpet you walk on I'm not one small atomic bomb I'm not any any any anything at all."

"Now, now ... You don't mean that say you're sorry You don't mean that ... I'll make you sorry"

"I'm not the pawn to your king I'm not your world on a string I'm not anyone you'll beat I'm not anything"

"While Jesus is saving, I'm spending all my days in backgrounds and landscapes with the languages of saints. While people are spinning like toys on Christmas day, I'm inside a still life with the other absentee."

"While people will cheer on the spectacle we've made I'm sitting and sculpting menageries of saints."

"Come, my love, the stage is waiting, Be the one to save my saving grace."

"While Jesus is saving, I'm spending all my grace, on rosy-red pallor of lights on center stage. While people have cheered on the awful mess we've made, through storms of red roses we've exited the stage"

"Your lips are red My face is red from reading your red lips"

"Your skin's so fair its not fair"

"Marry me, John, I'll be so good to you — You won't realize I'm gone, You won't realize I'm gone."

"Many people wanna make money, make love, make friends, make peace with death — But most mainly want to win the game they came to win they want to come out ahead. But you, you're a rock, with a heart like a socket I can plug into at will. And will you guess when I come around next. I hope your open sign is blinking still."

"As for me I would have to agree, I'm as fickle as a paper doll being kicked by the wind — when I touch down again I'll be in someone elses arms"

"I read the signs, I got all my stars aligned, My amulets, my charms, I set all my false alarms, So I'll be someone Who won't be forgotten."

"I do a dance to make the rain come, Smile to keep the sky from falling down, down, down, down. Collect the love that I've been given Build a nest for us to sleep in here You know it's real."

"There are no signs, There are no stars aligned, No amulets no charms, To bring you back to my arms. There's just this human heart. That's built with this human fault. What was your question? Love is the answer."

"It's time. You are light. I guess you are afraid of what everyone is made of — Time and Light."

"All your praying moments amount to just one breath. Please keep your victory But give me little death."

"I'm crawling through landmines Just to know where you are."

"Romeo, where'd you go? It's been years and still no sign, But I'm keeping hope alive.Juliet, how you been? You look like death like you sure could use some rest from this place human racing and the faces of people who pound at your door They always want more — they want more."

"Tell the truth now Your heart is a strange little orange to peel What's the deal?"

"Little lamb, what's your plan? Greener pastures in the sky? It's a shame you want to die know why Just to find you've been blinded to the greenest of pastures they're right here on Earth For what it's worth you're not the first to break my heart."

"Lover, I don’t play to win but for the thrill until I’m spent. Paint the black hole blacker. Paint the black hole blacker"

"What do I share? What do I keep from all the strangers Who sleep where I sleep?"

"Good souls have born better sons, Better souls born worse ones. Paint the black hole blacker..."

"The keys are in my pocket and they rattle you awake."

"I'm a wife in watercolors I can wash away what seventeen cold showers couldn't wash away."

"Honey what reveals you is what you hide away."

"Let's pour wine in coffee cups and drive around the neighborhood And shine the headlights on houses until all the news is good."

"Tomorrow's some kind of Strangerland where all the news is good."

"What would the neighbors think? Oh no! If they only knew."

"Tomorrow's some kind of Stranger I'm not supposed to see."

"You're a supplement, You're a salve, You're a bandage, pull it off I can quit you, cut it out. You're a patient, iron lung."

"I think I love you I think I'm mad."

"The unkissed girls and boys of paradise Are lining up around the block Back pockets full of dynamite While their neighbors talk and talk."

"Just like an amnesiac, trying to get my senses back. Oh where did they go."

"I traded my plot of land for a plane to anywhere Oh where did you go. And I can't see the future but I know it's watching me. All my old friends aren't so friendly And all my old haunts are now haunting me."

"I wish I had a gentle mind and a spine made up of iron."

"Honey can you reach the spots that need oiling and fixing. H E L P Help Me."

"If you want we could go somewhere else."

"We're sleeping underneath the bed to scare The monsters out With our dear daddy's Smith and Wesson. We've got to teach them all a lesson."

"Honey the party went away quickly, but thats the trouble with ticking and talking."

"Oh but I'd pay anything to keep my conscience clean. I'm keeping my eyes on the the exit sign. Steady now."

"I'm just the same but brand new And anything you wrote I checked for codes and clues."

"Bodies like wrecking balls fuck, fuck with dynamite."

"You can hear one note of a Kate Bush song, or one note of her voice even, and know immediately what it is. And that is the biggest feat of any artist, especially when you consider, you know, all the roads that she's gone down."

"For that to have come out of someone's brain, period, is a remarkable feat. For that to have come out of someone's brain, at 17 years old — this incredible song, incredible song … there aren't that many amazing pop songs that have two or three key changes in them —‚ and I'm not talking about some modulations, I'm talking: "Okay, now we're in the key of Q." It's like WHAT?! But it's so brilliant, it's so memorable. I always karaoke that song — if I drink enough."

"I read an interview with her one time, where she was asked, something along the lines of "Why do you write from the perspective of a lot of characters?" And she said very simply and eloquently "because they're more interesting than I am.""

"I'm convinced that, as great as that record sounds, if you had anyone else sing it, you know, anyone else try to kind of weave and make it do that thing where it burns like wildfire and it comes alive, no one else could do it. It's incredible the way she kind of brings this cold arctic atmosphere, It's just like fire, you know? It's like all aaarh coming out of her mouth. … and now I'm listening to the song in my head. "Do you know what I really need? Do you know what I really need? I need lalalala yea yo yea yo your love.""

"I still remember going to the CD store and buying The Sensual World when I was 16, and the cover — there was a rose in front of her mouth, that has bloomed, she's got big wide eyes, and I remember, you know, putting it on the shitty car stereo on the way home, you know — and my life was forever changed."

"You don’t ever get the sense that she's making music to pander to anyone. I think you always get her absolute best attempt at her true vision whenever you get a Kate Bush record."

"The first time I saw her perform — she must’ve been 15, maybe 14 — she got up in a club in Dallas, sat in with her guitar teacher’s band, played "The Wind Cries Mary" and just blew everybody away. ... At that time she was very shy and diminutive, except when you listened to her guitar playing. ... She’s physically a very intense player. She takes a kind of ferocious approach to the technique of the guitar, a real high energy."

"Her stage name was inspired by the hospital where Dylan Thomas spent his last hours. “It’s the place where poetry comes to die,” she said, joking. “That’s me.""

"Time, flowing like a river Time, beckoning me Who knows when we shall meet again If ever But time Keeps flowing like a river To the sea"

"While the children laughed I was always afraid Of the smile of the clown So I close my eyes Till I can't see the light And I hide from the sound We're two of a kind Silence and I We need a chance to talk things over Two of a kind Silence and I"

"Thank you very much. This is Lisa and this is Wendy. Want to hold it? [Gives the Oscar to Wendy] This is very unbelievable. I could've never imagined this in my wildest dreams. And I would like to thank the Academy, Mr. Albert Magnoli, my manager Steven. Bob, Joe, Bobby, Mark and Matt, who couldn't be with us today. And most of all, God. Thank you very much."

"At this point, I wouldn't want to jinx it by meeting him. His arrangements are incredible. I just send him a tape, we talk on the phone, and he sends me the finished orchestra tracks. Hear that? I'm gonna get that chord on the radio!"

"It's a hurtful place, the world, in and of itself. We don't need to add to it. And we're in a place now where we all need one another, and it's going to get rougher."

"Well, the reason why is because I'm one of Jehovah's Witnesses and we've never voted. That's not to say that I don't think Barack Obama - President Obama - is a very smart individual and he seems like he means well. Prophecy is what we all have to go by now."

"The internet's completely over. [...] The internet's like MTV. At one time MTV was hip and suddenly it became outdated. Anyway, all these computers and digital gadgets are no good. They just fill your head with numbers and that can't be good for you."

"Chris Rock: I love the story of how you turned down an offer to appear in Michael Jackson's music video for, Bad. Prince: You know that Wesley Snipes character? That would've been me. Now you run that video in your mind. The first line in that song is "your butt is mine." Now I said to Michael, who's gonna sing that to whom? 'Cause you sure ain't singing it to me and I sure ain't singing it to you so right there we got a problem."

"I've been to the mountaintop. There's nothing there."

"Everyone has a rock bottom"

"Love... Thy will be done I can no longer hide, I can no longer run No longer can I resist Your guiding light That gives me the power 2 keep up the fight Oh Lord, Love... Thy will be done Since I have found you, my life has just begun And I see all of Your creations as one perfect complex No one less beautiful or more special than the next We are all blessed and so wise 2 accept Thy will, Love, be done."

"You can live your own life and I'll live mine I will never try to keep you down And even if I only see you some of the time I'm just happy when you come around And even if the sun don't shine I'm warm enough when you're in these arms of mine Just as long as we're together."

"I wanna be your lover I wanna be the only one that makes you come running I wanna be your lover I wanna turn you on, turn you out, all night long, make you shout Oh, lover! Yeah. I wanna be the only one you come for."

"There's some talk going 'round town That you really don't give a damn They say you really put me down When I'm doing the best I can I gave you all of my love I even gave you my body Tell me, baby, ain't that enough?"

"Now where I come from We don't let society Tell us how it's supposed to be Our clothes, our hair We don't care It's all about being there Everybody's going Uptown That's where I wanna be Uptown Set your mind free."

"I just can't believe all the things people say—Controversy Am I black or white? Am I straight or gay? -- Controversy Do I believe in God? Do I believe in me?"

"Do I believe in God? Do I believe in me? Some people wanna die so they can be free (I said) Life is just a game, we're all just the same...do you wanna play?"

"C'mon everybody, yeah, this is your life I'm talking about a revolution we gotta organize We don't need no segregation, we don't need no race New age revelation, I think we got a case.I'm OK as long as u are here with me Sexuality is all we ever need."

"I was dreamin' when I wrote this So sue me if I go 2 fast. But life is just a party, and parties weren't meant 2 last. War is all around us, my mind says prepare 2 fight So if I gotta die I'm gonna listen 2 my body tonight.Yeah, they say two thousand zero zero party over, oops out of time So tonight I'm gonna party like it's 1999."

"I guess I shoulda closed my eyes When U drove me 2 the place Where your horses run free. 'Cuz I felt a little ill When I saw all the pictures Of the jockeys that were there before me.Believe it or not, I started to worry I wondered if I had enough class. But it was Saturday night I guess that makes it all right And U say, "Baby, have U got enough gas?""

"I get delirious whenever you're near Lose all self-control, baby just can't steer Wheels get locked in place Stupid look on my face. It comes 2 makin' a pass, pretty mama I just can't win a race."

"Dearly beloved We are gathered here today 2 get through this thing called life.Electric word life It means forever and that's a mighty long time But I'm here 2 tell U There's something else: The afterworld.A world of never ending happiness U can always see the sun, day or night."

"So when u call up that shrink in Beverly Hills U know the one - Dr Everything'll Be Alright Instead of asking him how much of your time is left Ask him how much of your mind, baby.'Cuz in this life Things are much harder than in the afterworld In this life, You're on your own."

"Dr. Everything'll Be Alright will make everything go wrong Pills and thrills and daffodils will kill Hang tough children."

"I knew a girl named Nikki I guess U could say she was a sex fiend I met her in a hotellobby Masturbating with a magazine. She said "How'd U like 2 waste some time?" And I could not resist when I saw little Nikki grind."

"Dig if U will the picture Of U and I engaged in a kiss. The sweat of your body covers me. Can U my darling, Can U picture this?Dream if U can a courtyard, An ocean of violets in bloom. Animals strike curious poses; They feel the heat, The heat between me and U."

"How can U just leave me standing? Alone in a world that's so cold? (So cold) Maybe I'm just 2 demanding Maybe I'm just like my father, 2 bold Maybe you're just like my mother She's never satisfied (She's never satisfied) Why do we scream at each other? This is what it sounds like When doves cry."

"I'm not a woman; I'm not a man. I am something that U'll never understand. I'll never beat U; I'll never lie. And if U're evil I'll forgive U by and by."

"I never meant 2 cause u any sorrow I never meant 2 cause u any pain I only wanted 2 one time see u laughing I only wanted 2 see u laughing in the purple rain."

"There is a park that is known 4 the face it attracts colorful people whose hair On 1 side is swept back The smile on their faces It speaks of profound inner peace Ask where they're going They'll tell U nowhere They've taken a lifetime lease On Paisley Park."

"I was workin' part-time in a 5-and-dime. My boss was Mr. McGee, huh. He told me several... times That he didn't like my kind cuz I was a bit 2 leisurely. It seems that I was busy doin' somethin' close 2 nothin', But different than the day before That's when I saw her, ooh, I saw her, She walked in through the out door ...out door.She wore a raspberry beret The kind U find in a second hand store Raspberry beret And if it was warm she wouldn't wear much more Raspberry beret I think I love her."

"Pop life Everybody needs a thrill Pop life We all got a space 2 fill Pop life Everybody can't be on top But life it ain't real funky Unless it's got that pop Dig it."

"I want to live life to the ultimate high, Maybe I'll die young like heroes die, Maybe I'll kiss you some wild special way. If nobody kills me or thrills me soon, I'll die in your arms under the cherry moon."

"Happiness in it's uncut form Is the feeling that I get, you're warm, warm Happy's what I get when we do what we do Happiness, mama, is being with u Good lord."

"Women not girls rule my world I said they rule my world Act your age, mama (not your shoe size) Not your shoe size Maybe we could do the twirl U don't have 2 watch Dynasty 2 have an attitude U just leave it all up 2 me My love will be your food Yeah.U don't have 2 be rich 2 be my girl U don't have 2 be cool 2 rule my world Ain't no particular sign I'm more compatible with I just want your extra time and your Kiss."

"Oh yeah In France a skinny man Died of a big disease with a little name By chance his girlfriend came across a needle And soon she did the same At home there are seventeen-year-old boys And their idea of fun Is being in a gang called The Disciples High on crack, totin' a machine gun."

"Here we are folks The dream we all dream of Boy versus girl in the World Series of love Tell me, have U got the look?"

"U walked in (I walked in) I woke up (U woke up) I never seen a pretty girl look so tough' baby (baby) U got that look, yes U do (yes U do) Color U peach and black Color me takin' aback, baby Crucial, I think I wantcha."

"And I said, baby don't waste your time I know what's on your mind U wouldn't be satisfied with a one night stand And I could never take the place of your man."

"I'm going down 2 Alphabet Street I'm gonna crown the first girl that I meet I'm gonna talk so sexy She'll want me from my head 2 my feet."

"This feeling's so good in every single way, I want it morning, noon and night of every day; And if by chance I cannot have it, I can't say But with it I know heaven's just a kiss away."

"I've seen the future and it will be I've seen the future and it works If there's life after, we will see So I can't go like a jerk Systematic overthrow of the underclass Hollywood conjures images of the past New world needs spirituality that will last I've seen the future and it will be."

"Pardon me 4 living, but this is my world 2 I can't help that what's cool to us might be strange to u. Pardon me 4 breathing, can we borrow some of your air? The problem with u and your kind is that u don't know love is there."

"Gett off - 23 positions in a 1 night stand. Gett off - I'll only call u after if u say I can. Gett off - let a woman be a woman and a man be a man. Gett off - if u want 2 baby here I am (Here I am)."

"Could you be The most beautiful girl in the world? Could you be? It's plain to see. You're the reason that God made a girl. Oh, yes, you are."

"It's 2 o'clock in the morning and I just can't sleep Outside the rain is pourin', I'm lonely as can be Maybe 2night'll be different than the nights before I need 2 feel someone beside me, I can't be alone no more"

"I’ve never seen the moon look so lovely as the night I saw it with you. It let me know I’d never seen the moon before. (Never seen the moon before) So many speak of the moon as though it had no flaws. But to compare it to a beauty like yours would give one pause."

"Somebody like Prince, who is so impressive as a human being, it is difficult to not completely canonize him. He is amazing, a gift to humanity. But at the same time, he was a guy we worked with every day and it could get really stressful and annoying. One day he'd come in and be all excited and energetic and happy and want to goof around. The next day he'd walk in really somber with a cloud over his head, mumble into the microphone, and be a dick. Evey show we played, he videotaped and made us watch on the bus afterward. He was charming and funny, but also boring, repetitive and self-absorbed."

"[M]ost of the pop music out today I consider to have become a homogenized product. It gets to the point that so much of what is going on is copying everything else that is out, because there is a businessman that knows what he has just sold millions of records with, and so he keeps trying to get every group that comes in to do it, you know. You know, you approach somebody who is well known as a booker or manager, and the first remark will be, "I love what you do, but you would have to change this to this, and that to that, and this to this, in order for me to be able to sell it." Well, by the time you've changed that, of course, it's like everything else that is out there. And when Prince first started sending me songs, I thought maybe that by the time I had done four arrangements that I would have started getting some sort of a repetitive something or other. I have been extremely surprised to find that each one is as different from the last as the next one is going to be different. Some of them are like little art songs. Some of them have dealt with heavy things like friendship and death. I mean, death of a friend. And yet, some of them are as baudy as..."

"I've talked to him on the phone, received notes through the mail, but I've never seen him face to face. I sent him my last LP and I understand that he turned his head away as he took the disc out, saying, "I don't want to see what he looks like. I have this image and I don't want to destroy it." So there's a certain amount of mystery involved. I suppose if he knew I were a gray-haired, older guy with a big paunch, he might say, "Oh, that ruins it.""

"Prince is intelligent. He never visits the studio when I am working for him; and I have never met him in person. He sends me memos and we talk over the phone. Once I sent him my Grammy-winning CD. I heard from people that were present at the time that while he took out the disc he looked away from the cover, saying, 'I don't want to know what he looks like. It is working just fine as it is.' Prince does not want to meet me because he knows that the minute he walks into a studio he will start interfering. It is uncommon that a person with such a strong ego realizes that I have an ego too."

"Last night I was watching TV. I was watching . And he had Prince on. I wanna— What a character he is! Holy cow! Entertainer. Singer. And he can dance. He's a little bitty guy. He had a weird beard. I tell ya it was— I couldn't explain it."

"The morning of the game, I opened the curtains in my hotel room, and Oh my God — it was like a scene from Moby Dick — it was like the winds were blowing the palm tress, the rains were one of those Miami rainstorms which would just not relent ... were in this truck, sitting behind Don Mischer, and I remember Don said, put me off the phone with Prince. Don says, "I want you to know it's raining" — and Prince, like: "Yes it's raining" — and "Are you OK?" And Prince was like "Can you make it rain harder?" — and I thought Right on! … To me its about one guy in front of a hundred thousand people, and a hundred million people on television, and its your moment to be "Prince — at the Super Bowl", and Mother Nature is dropping thousands and thousands of gallons of rain. I always thought, how cool the guy is — to rise up and to just get stormed upon — and just bring what he brought — that was so special."

"I think Prince was heads, hands and feet about all the rest of them, I thought he left (Michael) Jackson in the dust. Prince was way beyond that. But how pathetic that he killed himself. Don't kid yourself, that's what he did. Slowly, I'll grant you … but that's what drugs and alcohol is: a slow death."

"Isn’t the artist’s characteristic to surprise and often to be where no one expects him? What seems certain in any case is that Prince was no exception to the rule. While he was internationally known as a singer, guitarist and dancer, he took the initiative of playing solo piano on stage at concerts held at his Paisley Park studios in Chanhassen, Minnesota, in the United States and Australia. (…) Prince had no alter ego. Neither in his extravagances, nor in his ultra-sophisticated and perfectionist showman performances. Nor even in his final improvisations on the piano...""

"Sit on a park wall Ask all the right questions "Why are the horses racing taxis in the winter?""

"Every dollar counts And every morning hurts We mostly work to live Until we live to work"

"But, wait, Oh, it's much too late Oh, and I cannot be walking home Until I've found my love."

"I think ur a contra, And I think that you’ve lied. Don’t call me a contra Till you’ve tried."

"His Honor drove southward seeking exotica, Down to the pueblo huts of New Mexico, Cut his teeth on turquoise harmonicas, Oh, Oh, Oh..."

"a writer once asked what I'd say if i ever met my biggest hater. I paused, thought deeply and said, "probably 'suk a dog dik, motherfuker'""

"that story is 93% true"

"#1000daysof1d congratulations. may you reign for 1000 years. your humble servant, ezra"

"7 min or less - ur not late, 7-10 "sorry", 10-20 "SO sorry!", 20-30 "i am truly ashamed", over 30 min late - fake ur own death"

"Love when you can Cry when you have to... Be who you must That's a part of the plan Await your arrival With simple survival And one day we'll all understand... Your conscience awakes and you see your mistakes And you wish someone would buy your confession The days miss their mark and the night gets so dark"

"Dusty day dawning Three hours late Open the curtains And let the rest wait My mind goes running Three thousand miles east I may miss the harvest But I won't miss the feast... And it looks like you're gonna Have to see me again... Cause I've got a woman Who waits for me there And I need a breath of that Sweet country air"

"Changing horses in the middle of a stream Gets you wet and sometimes cold"

"I can see you in the distance And you're heading for a fall Sinking deeper by the minute You're about to lose it all... You better change Before the sun goes down You better leave Before you are the last in town You better raise Your fortresses or tear them down... Tear them down!"

"As the Raven Flies Lyrics I see the raven's made Her nest in your eyes She's got you thinking that Her love is a prize And you'll go under from The weight of her lies"

"Now the wind is still In a moment it will be raging Now my soul is young In a moment it will be aging And high above the pines I wrote several lines And left them in a bottle For you to find"

"Someone's been telling you stories Someone's been telling you stories And they just ain't true No, they just ain't true They just ain't true Someone's been telling you stories]]."

"There's a place in the world For a gambler There's a burden that only he can bear... And he sees. Oh, yes he sees... There's a light in the depths Of your darkness There's a calm at the eye Of every storm There's a light in the depths Of your [[blindness|darkness}} Let it shine Oh, let it shine"

"Gonna pull in the shutters on this heart of mine Roll up the carpets and pull in the blinds And retreat to the chambers that I left behind In hopes there still may be love left to find Still may be love left to find."

"Longer than there've been fishes in the ocean Higher than any bird ever flew. Longer than there've been stars up in the heavens, I've been in love with you."

"Along the road your steps may stumble Your thoughts may start to stray But through it all a heart held humble Levels and lights your way."

"And it's run for the roses As fast as you can Your fate is delivered Your moment's at hand It's the chance of a lifetime In a lifetime of chance And it's high time you joined In the dance It's high time you joined In the dance."

"An only child alone and wild A cabinet maker's son. His hands were meant for different work And his heart was known to none -- He left his home and went his lone and solitary way And he gave to me a gift I know I never can repay."

"The leader of the band is tired And his eyes are growing old But his blood runs through my instrument And his song is in my soul -- My life has been a poor attempt To imitate the man. I'm just a living legacy To the leader of the band."

"We drank a toast to innocence We drank a toast to now. And tried to reach beyond the emptiness But neither one knew how."

"The beer was empty and our tongues were tired And running out of things to say. She gave a kiss to me as I got out And I watched her drive away.Just for a moment I was back at school And felt that old familiar pain And as I turned to make my way back home The snow turned into rain."

"She says no When she means yes And what she wants You know that I can't guess. When we want more You know we ask for less Such is the language of love..."

"Too many hearts have been broken Failing to trust what they feel. But trust isn't something that's spoken And love's never wrong when it's real."

"Looking back now toward the start You said you thought I'd lost my path And I asked if you still considered love an art And you said "No, I think it's more a craft" And I just turned and laughed I just had to turn and laugh."

"Venturing further than the length of your sight Out past the reach of your beginnings There is a gamble in each proud act of flight But the losses pale before the winnings Circling and diving with this freedom you’ve found Illusion blows apart and scatters There is no darkness in this place that we're bound Love is the only thing that matters"

"I want not to panic. I want to be comfortable in my body and my life. I don't want to keep thinking that I don't belong here, that I have ended up on the wrong planet, completely alienated. (from Changeling)"

"In this world, everything has a pulse or a vibration. This sound is unique to each living or non-living thing and in itself creates a music that no-one can hear. I believe that this has a very powerful resonance with, and a deep effect on, our lives. What would happen if we took this further and applied it to bigger things, more powerful things; like an entire solar system or galaxy say, what would that sound like? Musica Universalis is the ancient theory that every celestial body, the sun, the moon and the stars, has an inner music. This is a harmonic and mathematical concept derived from the movements of the planets in the solar system. The music created is inaudible to the human ear. Music of the Spheres is my interpretation of this theory. Every planet and every star; the whole universe has music within it that no-one can hear. This is what it would sound like if it was set free. This is Music of the Spheres. (from the introduction to Music of the Spheres)"

"The biggest problems were to do with... well, to get that successful when you're so young, it attracts hangers-on, parasites, people who want to feed off you. I thought people actually liked me, but they actually liked my money. I'd probably say to my younger self, get yourself a whole collection of lawyers. Which is what I have now. I don't have any friends; I just have lawyers. At the last count I had about 15 different sets of them for all kinds of problems. And you can trust them because you're paying them. I know that sounds very negative, but that's the world we live in."

"When I was younger I had an incredible sensitivity; I suppose there were too many brain cells, or they were organised in the wrong way, and they've either reorganised themselves or I've lost lots of them through alcohol and substance abuse. I can get along without being terrified now. Maybe I've just got used to it."

"Everything on Tubular Bells was done on the first take – it was lovely, so spontaneous. I had such a long time to prepare it, and I had just one little chance to do it, and now I listen to it and it has a lovely spontaneous energy. It's got mistakes, and I could easily have cut them out, but I left them on."

"If it was a horrible thing I was known for, like some horrible pop song, it would annoy me, but it doesn't. I'm proud of it."

"We're looking For the strangers With sunlight in their eyes Who lived on Earth When Man was new When Time was Just a coloured dew That grew inside their mind..."

"Hey, cool princess With your eyes hanging The milk of the moon Hey, pretty princess Take me down to your cave in the dawn And you're gonna be a queen When the stars water Heaven with tears And you gonna love me When all our Golden lands are free."

"I watch the boats go by As the evening colours of the sand The rain is bringing tears From my lover's land I watch the silver stars melt in love with the sea I cry to the wind: – Bring back my lover to me! -"

"Come, take my hand And wander in the willow river Glistening the blue bells Come, take my flesh And wander in the sunny corn That shimmer stills at snowfalls 'Cause I love you lover I love you, like I love The Four high Seasons."

"My moon shines so softly On the hair of my killer Pours flowers on his head Help me, give him some shelter! Come, lie by the river Rest your head, don't you fear Sleep softly, my baby They won't find you here."

"Don't wanna know your name You're just my lover Just wanna spend the night Walking beside you on the water You look like my lover But you're words are cold You say words like him But thinking has made you grow old."

"Little bluebird's Fluttering into my hand Sun falls in love over the land I will live forever Just you wait and see No matter want you do To my bluebird and me..."

"Sunlight falling bright Over village garden walls Moonlight shower's gold where leaving waterfalls People walk in splendour Under trees hung in starlight."

"Oh, my love You're searching For your name Beside the sea Of dwells and dreams Where Shadows're dancing For your glance... The sky would chance The granting of a dream To the restless soul That dwells within your heart..."

"Some find it strange to be here On this small planet and who knows where... But when it's strange and full of fear It's nice to be on horseback."

"The sails are unfurled And the anchor's away going home... She heels to the breeze as she gathers her way, And we're bound to the old country. Then away, love, away, going home! We're homeward bound this very day, And we're bound to the old country..."

"Speak, vision of the night, Tell me why you haunt me so... Speak, heaven morning light, Whisper all my heart would know. Dawn never finds you, Gone back to where the Shadows dwell... Speak, my beloved, speak, tho' you only say farewell!"

"With a smile of joy and gladness, with a look of exultation, as of one who in a vision what is to be, but it is not, stood and waited Hiawatha. Toward the sun his hands were lifted both the palms spread out toward it and, between departed fingers, felt the sunshine on his features. Flecked with light his naked shoulders, as it falls and flecks an oak-tree through the rifted leaves and branches."

"Can it be the sun descending o'er the level plain of water or the Red Swan floating, flying wounded by the Magic Arrow? Staining all the waves with crimson, with the crimson of its life-blood, filling all the air with splendor, filling all the air with plumage? [...] O'er it the Star of Evening melts and trembles through the purple, hangs suspensed in twilight, walks in silence through the heavens..."

"Queen and Huntress chaste and fair Now the Sun is laid to sleep Seated in the Silver Chair State in wonder Manner keep [...] Hesperus entreats Thy light Goddess excellently bright Bless us then with a wished sight Thou who mak'st the day of night..."

"The Watcher and the Tower Waiting hour by hour."

"The trees that whisper in the evening Carried away by a moonlight shadow Sing a song of sorrow and grieving Carried away by a moonlight shadow All she saw was a silhouette of a gun Far away on the other side He was shot six times by a man on the run And she couldn't find how to push trough I stay, I pray, see you in heaven far away I stay, I pray, see you in heaven one day..."

"Look down from in high places Lift up the ground Without a sound [...] Check altitude Check your heart 'n this cloudless blue 'n this starlight night..."

"Drifting a dream On a mystical sea... A wishful emotion A drop in the ocean A hush in the air You can feel anywhere In the cool twilight Of a tropical night..."

"Treat me like I'm evil Freeze me till I'm cold Beat me till I'm feeble Grind me till I'm old Wire me till I'm tired Push me like I fall Treat me like a criminal, just a shadow on the wall!"

"Taking on water Sailing a restless sea From a memory A fantasy The wind carries into white water Far from the islands Don't you know... You're never going to get to France Mary, queen of chance, will they find you! Never going to get to France... Could a new romance ever bind you?"

"Walking on foreign ground Like a shadow Roaming in far off territory Over your shoulder Stories unfold You're searching For a sanctuary..."

"I see a picture by the lamp's flicker... Isn't it strange how dreams fade and shimmer?"

"Somebody's out to get you Hiding in the shadows Poison arrows! Somebody's out to break you Hiding in narrows Poison arrows!"

"What you gonna do? Time is running out on you! Anyway you choose Anyway you're gonna lose..."

"Watching for a spark It's a moonlight show Reaching through the dark Do you have to go?"

"Voices in the dark And the lights burn low Teach yourself the art That you never know Try to put a message through To your sweetheart Won't you like to know The secrets of the heart?"

"I'm half a crazy man Waiting for confirmation; Signs keep are changing And I need some more information."

"Something tells me how Her bright blue eyes Are smiling; She turns her head and now When she wants she denies him..."

"Some are tricks of the light You'll never know Make a flickering midnight Light into a glow..."

"When you want the score When you need a helping hand And you find closed doors And you're back where you began Keeping those secrets Telling those lies... Can anybody tell me What's the big surprise?"

"How can you sleep How can you turn away Thinking so cheap? Some day you're gonna pay! You're keeping secrets I can see in your eyes: Can anybody tell me Why the big disguise?"

"Talk about your life I'd like to know It's not easy going Where no-one goes And no-one knows..."

"Do we have to be so distant How can you be so unreal? What's the reason for hiding and How this crying make you feel?"

"Saved by a bell Suffer in hell But you were too blind to tell! Saved by a bell Suffer in hell And you made it through so well!"

"Standing in a new space, Waving at the sun... So you probably back in darkness To where I belong. Just by being with you Pictures flow out of my mind... Have we danced before Long ago or in another time?"

"We are islands But never too far"

"We can never Be closer somehow For the moment that lasts Is this moment now"

"There's a new path That we found just today I was lost in the forest And you showed me the way"

"We took a place in the sun To see just what had become The warm wind blows constantly Does the answer still blow? Did you find your château In that Mediterranean fantasy?"

"On dusty roads and tracks Now it's the time to turn back The warm wind blows constantly Riding that storm Since the day you were born Is there somebody in? Now answer me"

"The writing on the wall at North Point Speaks to a silent room They shut the bars down, leave you to the gloom"

"Somewhere far above has a new day risen Way beyond the searchlight (Comes a light, comes a light) Then on a bright day at North Point The gate was open wide They chanced to look at what was inside"

"Once in a lifetime, you find that power To break out and run from the Devil's deep clutch All that you need (it's the finest hour) Is to believe in the magic touch"

"Can't believe it, like no other Love is a gift, and you take it so much! You need the blue night to discover Only true lovers have the magic touch"

"Someone who knows no fear I feel him near The child was born to be a king And the time has come"

"And now the story's just begun A thousand years to stay We wake each morning with the sun To live our dreams away"

"I was hoping Could you be my inspiration Whatever should become In the candlelight? I was dreaming Was it my imagination? Tomorrow never comes In the candlelight"

"I was listening To the wind that walks the hours I never would have heard In the candlelight I was hoping Would you shelter me from showers? I believe every word In the candlelight"

"Harmony is always when I look around me And your smile I see I can feel it surrounds me A miracle I find in your company."

"One glance is all that I need; What I was searching for I've found it..."

"Holy, to me just one glance is holy One touch of your heart to me that's holy..."

"You can't speak, you can't sleep, You daren't move, you're confused. You never talk, you can't walk You can't feel, you're not real..."

"If I open my eyes just far enough I can see what you're doing. Go on, fight to the end, it's though enough When you're on the road of ruin!"

"You're a hostage of the heart Twisted 'round the smallest finger Two burning eyes are tearing you apart Turn your soul into a cinder!"

"She takes the rain, turns it to sun, And my soul she fills it. Where once was a desert Rivers now run, and my storms she stills it..."

"She gives me hope When there's nothing but pain; I can't explain it: Two different leaves But the branch is the same... Forever let it be! She takes the rain..."

"I know you'll never stay the same In time, most of us lose it, But I'm hoping, just the same, You'll shine and learn how to use it."

"Smile to me, like the very first smile You are magnificent when you're innocent. Walk to me Like the very first walk You are from heaven sent when you're innocent."

"Save me, holy mother, please save me, I got a heart of gold... And for your love I'd go hungry and thirsty. I need a saviour and you're the one... I throw myself into the arms of mercy, There's still hope for the runaway son!"

"I've been waiting at this frontier And it seems like a hundred years, But I couldn't see past the gate I couldn't see past the hate."

"Will-power, give me back some to survive, One more hour and I'm coming alive... I can see the light! And there's blue sky breaking Through the edge of the night... I can see the light!"

"Now I climb the steps to freedom, The open gates, I can see them. Hands once I knew Beckoning me through, As the sunlight touch my face, I can feel the warm embrace; Arms surround me, My life has found me..."

"I feel a rush in the air tonight, I can feel the Earth moving. Love is beacon, a guiding light, can't you feel the Earth moving?"

"Feel the Earth move! Now I'm wrapped In a sweet love's arms, Reaching out for you..."

"Reach out, it's a leap in the dark, But there's no danger of falling. Give out, give it straight from the heart, You feel the thunder rolling..."

"To whole room her eyes are numb, As she reads from a true love story. From the pages of a book her lover comes, Her heart bleeds, it's a true love story."

"Misty path and the night is endless, She could be a queen Or a desert princess. Hero takes her hand and leads her through... Who knows what this night will do? Only in the blue night he comes to her That's when the whole night Belongs to her."

"You know it's not too late to leave tomorrow, 'cause I know where I'm going... I am building a bridge to Paradise!"

"HEALTH WARNING: This record could be hazardous to the health of cloth-eared nincompoops. If you suffer from this condition, consult your Doctor immediately. (from the back-cover)"

"Hello everyone! I suppose that you think that nothing much is happening at the moment. Ah ah ah! Well, that's what I want to talk to you all about: endings. Now, endings normally happen at the end. But, as we all know, endings are just beginnings. You know, once these things really get started, it's jolly hard to stop them again. However, as we have all come this far, I think, under the circumstances, the best solution is that we all just keep going. Let's keep going inside, never an ending. Let's remember that this world wants fresh beginnings. I feel here, in this Country, and throughout the world, we are crying out for beginnings, beginnings! We never want to hear this word "endings". I know you don't want to sit down. Of course, you're looking for the good start. Of course you're looking for a fresh start. Isn't that charming? Do you know, I really feel I could dance..."

"This is zero hour and there's no way back Can you feel that power in its arms you're wrapped All through the night-time Till the sun comes in? Now Heaven's Open Fly right in!"

"Make-make... There's no way out no way in To the hallowed halls of the inner ring You're just a face in the crowd You got no place When you're down and out."

"Monna Lisa, you can stop searching; don't you know we're not Virgin?"

"A restless flame Someone calls your name Through the empty hall Casting shadows on the wall In the sound of emptiness Isolation Nowhere left to run Now the time has come..."

"Down to the River Was this all some Cry for love? It's a cry for love: Are you a victim of That Money Bug In your blood, Mr. Shame?"

"I need my hands I need my feet Gimme my soul I'm incomplete I need my eyes I want my teeth Gimme my scope Gimme my beliefs."

"I'm a fire without a flame, desert with no rain..."

"You're the one who's nearly Breaking my heart; Had your chance You just threw it all away. Living in a world that You could never be a part of, And now is a time to walk away."

"How's it feel when There's time to remember? ...Branches bare, Like the trees in november. Had it all, Threw it all away; Now's a time to walk away."

"And the Man in the rain Picked up his bag of secrets, And journeyed up the mountainside Far above the clouds; And nothing was ever heard from him again, Except for the sound of Tubular Bells..."

"Heaven and Earth are turning Round the Earth fire is burning. Sheltered from the cruel storm Peace on Earth is new born"

"Far the horizon Hove to the wind; We're sailing the sea To the Edge of the World."

""Twas grace that taught My heart to fear, And grace my fears reliev'd; How precious did that grace appear, The hour I first believ'd!" And I want to feel sun on my face, And I feel a shadow in its place, With the sunlight shines through cloud, When we're standing free, proud."

"Thro' many dangers, toils and snares, I have already come; 'tis grace has brought me Safe thus far, And grace will lead me home. The Lord has promis'd good to me, His Word my hope secures; He will my shield and portion be, As long as life endures."

"When the birds sing outside And you see the trees Changing into green The sun invites one To be out in the open air. When the sky is so blue, then, Oh! Then I wish for so much!."

"Amber light Of this new morning, Amber light, Clear, bright and warming. Overnight The Earth adorning... Amber light, A New Age is dawning...."

"Follow the light that glows Through your bedroom window, Tonight, the fading twilight. There's a hollow deep in the woods, Where you know you're crazy to go, Not even meant to know there are... Pictures in the dark, I see all around, Voices calling underground; And I'm watching the stars since the world was found... One, two, three..."

"And in the deepest dark You come to a maze, in the night, The fading twilight... And you shiver the glistening path Where you know you're crazy to go..."

"(Take a wish!) My wish is... ...To be free, To be wild, And to be just Like a child!"

"You're out in the cold, Sometimes, As far as you can see, Misty. You want to run Into the sun, The road is lost, Sand shifty. But suddendly, out of the blue, Some kind of magic Pushes you through! You don't know when, How or why, But someday can take off, fly!"

"When we made [Tubular Bells], Michael was a mental wreck. He would walk 'round with his eyes wet with tears nearly all the time; he was in a terrible state. He found it an enormous disquiet, … the idea of being mortal flesh … [while] what was going on his head was eternal and beautiful and everlasting. … My heart went out to him."

"I was been raised to believe I was an artist. I believed what my parents said and fulfilled it, like a prophecy."

"All we have is the past, but for people of the future, there's not even going to be a history there. The history of recorded music has turned into a flat fucking screen of an iTunes playlist. I'm preserving something that's going extinct! That's all rock'n'roll has been since day one. It's all necrophilia."

"We started out to finish groups like U2 - that was what it was all about. And they're still the biggest band in the world, so we failed. We didn't really do anything, people wore flares for a year or two, d'you know what I mean? That's all we did."

"We broke up mostly because we didn't have a manager and everyone was on different drugs. I don't take them so it was a bit weird for me."

"It ain't the size of the dog in the fight, It's the size of the fight in the dog on the day or the night"

"This is sad. I just think it’s a little ridiculous we are still only looking at the surface of one another. Red hair? Blue hair? Pink? Blonde? Short? Long? Whatever. We might as well shave our heads. Hair has nothing to do with the reason we playing music. It’s a style. Something that will never last as long as the songs we play and the words we sing. Listen up ladies in bands, I’m so proud to be one of you and I don’t care if we all look exactly alike or if we are all carbon copies of each other. We have things to say and it’s up to us to get people to not just look but to LISTEN!"

"Love that so many of you are saying your 2 fav bands are Green Day & Paramore. Do you even realize how cool that is for us to hear!?"

"No boy is worth your teenage years!." "For me to be in love with someone means that I have to accept who I am, and not allow another person to define me. And if someone loves me in spite of all that, then that's a start."

"i have the ability to build myself up or break myself down. i stay positive. strength comes from within."

"This is what I've learned, in my life: is crucial. Growing up is hard to do. There's nothing wrong with wearing a dress."

""Boys! Hey boys out there: NEVER kiss a girl unless she says she... wants you to! Alright?!" "Never kiss a girl again. Unless she tells you she wants you to." (To the crowd, about a fan who just kissed her, and then to that boy)"

"“It’s odd to look out there and see a bunch of Mini-Mes,” says Williams. “You’re wondering what possessed them to do such a thing . . . It sort of does a reverse psychology on you. You’d think you’d be like `Hey, all these people want to look like me. I feel pretty cool.’ But actually it makes you feel more self aware and I’m not really fond of that.”"

"“I wake up in the morning and sometimes I just want to wear a T-shirt and blue jeans and now I have to force myself to do that, because I can’t care what people think, you know? . . ."

"stay as strong as you can and during the times you can't, let other people be strong for you."

"I'm always wrong But you're never right"

"Second chances they don't ever matter, people never change, once a whore you're nothing more, I'm sorry that'll never change. And about forgiveness we're both supposed to have exchanged. I'm sorry honey but I pass it up now look this way: There's a million other girls who do it just like you; looking as innocent as possible to get to who they want, and what they like it's easy if you do it right. Well I REFUSE, I REFUSE, I REFUSE!"

"If you wanna play it like a game, well, come one, come on, let's play. Cause I'd rather waste my life pretending; than have to forget you for one whole minute ..."

"We all learn to make mistakes and run from them."

"I'm only human. I've got a skeleton in me. But I'm not the villian, despite what you're always preaching."

"Why do you care what people think? Are you hooked up to their leash? You know anklebiters ate up your personality Try to remember how it felt To just make up your own steps And let anklebiters chew up and spit out someone else"

"I'm delighted to say I know Hayley and that she is an awesome girl. She's always up for being supportive and helping people out so it comes as no surprise that she decided to help me out with Jamie Murphy's competition. I have two passions in life - Motherwell FC and Paramore. I attend every Motherwell home match and I've seen Paramore nine times - six of those on the last tour they did here."

"First off, Paramore is the shit,I've always been a Hayley fan, and to work with her, that's another thing I didn't think would happen to me as soon as it did."

"Williams is one of the few who was unafraid to call out the mistreatment within emo, reminding people that it wasn’t always a safe space and refusing to become a “nostalgia band” by transcending the genre instead. The mark of a truly gifted frontperson is also their ability to speak out, and Williams has that in spades."

"Paramore wouldn’t be the band they are today without the vocal talent and creativity of lead singer Hayley Williams. From the moment their debut album, All We Know Is Falling, released in 2005, her name has been synonymous with women who defined alternative music. With over 15 years of making her mark on the scene, Williams has continued to support other women by providing them a platform and showcasing their artistry on Instagram. She’s a force in the music industry and shows no signs of slowing down anytime soon."

"While sexism hurts women most intimately, it also damages men severely."

"My mom was a housewife, and wasn't somebody that people would think of as a feminist, and when Ms. magazine came out we were incredibly inspired by it. I used to cut pictures out of it and make posters that said "Girls can do anything", and stuff like that, and my mom was inspired to work at a basement of a church doing anti-domestic violence work. Then she took me to the Solidarity Day thing, and it was the first time I had ever been in a big crowd of women yelling, and it really made me want to do it forever."

"I realized that was a pretty radical thing to do, because if you're present, you're going to be different every time. You're not going to give everybody what they want, which is the cardboard character. But you will give those five people there who get it what they want, because they'll be like, "I could totally do that." Whatever crazy shit they have in their heads. Maybe they'll realize, if she's getting away with it, maybe I can totally get away with this thing that I think is better."

"Interview Index (2000)."

"You don't necessarily have to have talent, you can just get up and do something and see where it takes you. I always tell girls who say they want to start a band but don't have any talent, well, neither do I. I mean, I can carry a tune, but anyone who picks up a bass can figure it out. You don't have to have magic unicorn powers."

"So many women have experienced horrific forms of male violence throughout their lives, and why isn't there a song about how you get depressed because of it? And you don't know what to do, and you don't know how to talk to your friends and how weird it is to be a feminist in that situation, where there's sort of the expectation that you're super-strong superwoman but you're just, like, eating pizza in your house avoiding talking about it."

"People have always had these weird things about how you have to be really good looking to be a singer. I mean, it's not like Stevie Nicks or Linda Ronstadt were dogs. It's not like this is some new thing. But there was at one point a larger variety, but now the catchphrase is "the whole package," the "American Idol" reality that you're a model first and a singer second."

"We wanted to start a magazine, and Allison Wolfe and Molly Neuman from the band Bratmobile had started a little fanzine called Riot Grrrl and we were writing little things for it. I'd always wanted to start a big magazine with really cool, smart writing in it, and I wanted to see if the other punk girls in D.C. that I was meeting were interested in that. So I called a meeting and found a space for it, and it just turned into this sort of consciousness-raising thing. I realized really quickly that a magazine wasn't the way to go. People wanted to be having shows, and teaching each other how to play music, and writing fanzines, so that started happening. It got some press attention, and girls in other places would be like "I wanna do that. I wanna start one of those.""

"Because we don't wanna assimilate to someone else's (boy) standards of what is or isn't."

"I, I wish you could swim Like the dolphins Like dolphins can swim Though nothing, nothing will keep us together We can beat them, forever and ever Oh, we can be heroes just for one day."

"When you see people like Ken Loach, David Miller, Jackie Walker, when you see those people being accused of antisemitism, you cannot help but say this is all made up."

"A way to make new music is to imagine looking back at the past from a future and imagine music that could have existed but didn't. Like East African free jazz, which as far as I know does not exist. To some extent, this was how ambient music emerged. My interest in making music has been to create something that does not exist that I would like to listen to, not because I wanted a job as a musician. I wanted to hear music that had not yet happened, by putting together things that suggested a new thing which did not yet exist. It's like having a ready-made formula if you are able to read it. One of the innovations of ambient music was leaving out the idea that there should be melody or words or a beat… so in a way that was music designed by leaving things out – that can be a form of innovation, knowing what to leave out. All the signs were in the air all around with ambient music in the mid 1970s, and other people were doing a similar thing. I just gave it a name. Which is exactly what it needed. A name. A name. Giving something a name can be just the same as inventing it. By naming something you create a difference. You say that this is now real."

"Saying that cultural objects have value is like saying that telephones have conversations."

"If you don’t call it art, you’re likely to get a better result."

"The only value of ideology is to stop things becoming showbiz."

"Ideas worth questioning: "Being an artist is a job for life.""

"The reason conservatives cohere and radicals fight: everyone agrees about fears, no one about visions."

"Try to make things that can become better in other people’s minds than they were in yours."

"My friend Peter Schmidt used to talk about ‘not doing the things that nobody had ever thought of not doing’, which is an inverse process – where you leave out an assumption that everybody has always made and see what happens (e.g. music has to be made of intentionally produced sounds was the assumption that Cage left out). In that version of this process, you discover a value in the absence of something ­– in fact you discover that the absence of something is the revelation of something else (Buñuel, the film-maker, said, "Every object conceals another" – a message that I often relay in the studio when overdubbing starts)."

"Rationality is what we do to organize the world, to make it possible to predict. Art is the rehearsal for the inapplicability and failure of that process."

"As struggles go, being an artist isn't that much of one."

"Ambient Music must be able to accommodate many levels of listening attention without enforcing one in particular; it must be as ignorable [sic] as it is interesting."

"At the party, Rob Partridge said to me, "You gave hope to other balding men." My new epitaph: "Co-wrote a couple of decent songs and went bald shamelessly.""

"The viola is the saddest of all instruments."

"I learn from thinking about the future, what hasn't been done yet. That's kind of my constant obsession."

"The avant-garde makes more sense to me."

"I'm content with making records, but I don't want to be doing the same thing all the time."

"The value of having a computer, to me, is that it'll remember everything you do. It's a databank."

"If you're all loaded up on love, you haven't got anywhere else to go."

"The only reason we wore sunglasses onstage was because we couldn't stand the sight of the audience."

"When somebody grabs a movement, you're kind of locked into it. It's all par for the course."

"Being a living legend is such a precarious livelihood. It’s like being a bar of soap in a shower which doesn’t have any water in it."

"I use cracks on the sidewalk to walk down the street. I'd always walk on the lines. I never take anything but a calculated risk, and do it because it gives me a sense of identity. Fear is a man's best friend."

"I am a ham. I've no business being rock 'n' roll. I've said it over and over again that I'm a classical composer, dishevelling my personality by dabbling in rock 'n' roll."

"I'm bent on proving that you can make living as musician and not die young and crazy like Mozart."

"I only hope that one day John will be recognized as … the Beethoven or something of his day. He knows so much about music, he's such a great musician. He's completely mad - but that's because he's Welsh."

"John Cale is fantastic, and he made the sound of the Velvet Underground."

"Never knew whether John Cale wanted to be Elvis Presley, Frankenstein's creature or the young Chopin."

"John Cale is a f*cking elitist. He did not like the people he was playing for. He's Welsh, and they're all nasty bastards."

"I never wanted to be put on a pedestal. I just wanted to make music. And believe me, many times I have thought I was going to quit. It's too much energy to pretend it's fun. You can call me a baby if you'd like, but life is too short to spend it being miserable."

"Turn it inside out, so I can see. The part of you, that's drifting over me. Because when I wake you're, you're never there. But, when I sleep? You're? You're everywhere, you're everywhere. Just tell me how I got this far? Just tell me why you're here, and who you are. Because every time I look, you're never there. And every time I sleep, you're always there. Because you're everywhere to me, and when I close my eyes? It's you I see, you're everything I know. That makes me believe, I'm not alone. I'm not alone."

"I wanted, to be like you. I wanted, everything. So, I tried. To be like you, and I got swept away. I didn't know that it was so cold and, you needed someone to show you the way. So I took your hand and we figured out, that when the time comes? I'd take you away. If you want to? I can save you; I can take you away from here. So lonely inside; so busy out there. And all you wanted, was somebody who cares."

"Of all the things I've believed in? I just want to get it over with. Tears form behind my eyes, but I do not cry. Counting the days that pass me by. I've been searching deep down in my soul. Words that I'm hearing? Are starting to get old. It feels like I'm starting, all over again. The last three years were just pretend. And I said, goodbye to you; goodbye to everything that I knew. You were the one I loved; the one thing I that I tried to hold on to."

"Now, don't just walk away. Pretending everything's okay, and you don't care about me. And I know there's just no use, when all your lies become your truths and I don't care. Could you look me in the eye? And tell me that you're happy now? Would you tell it to my face? Or have I been erased? Are you happy now? Are you happy now?"

"Love me or leave me, baby. Don't lead me on, with loving like yours? Believe me, I'm better off. I"m better off alone."

"There was something, about the way you looked at me. Made me think for a moment, that maybe we were meant to be. Living our lives separately, and it's strange that things change. But not me, wanting you so desperately. Oh, why can't I ignore it? I keep giving in, but I should know better. Because there was something about the way you looked at me, and it's strange that things change. But not me, wanting you so desperately."

"I've been driving for an hour; just talking to the rain. You say I've been driving you crazy, and it's keeping you away. So, just give me one good reason. Tell me why, I should stay. Because I don't want to waste another moment, saying things we never meant to say. And I? Take it, just a little bit. I? Hold my breath and count to ten, I? I've been waiting for a chance, to let you in. If I just, breathe? Let it fill the space between? I'll know, everything is alright. Breathe, every little piece of me. You'll see, everything is alright. If I just, breathe."

"The game of love is whatever you make it to be."

"Monday comes like a loaded gun and I'm trying to escape. Want to run. Want to chase the sun; let it wash the world away. Looking out on an empty street, thinking change is what I need. I feel slow. There's an open road and I need some sweet release. I want to get away, got to get away. Going where the road meets the sky, because I need a change. Yeah, I need a change."

"Everybody was telling me where to be and what to do; all I wanted was create this nest of security, have a normal life. At least I think that's what a therapist would have told me."

"Must have counted twenty thousand cold county lines; nothing here will get my weary soul to ignite. Hold me, hold me. Put me back together, baby. Show me that you love me; feels so good together. Every single fire, started with a spark. We could feel it burn, when we're dancing in the dark. Take me in your arms, before I fall apart. Baby, we're a fire that started with a spark."

"The reason why I'm successful is because Dan and I have been given the opportunity to fail so that we could sort things out on our own. But she has some dumbass with a Communications degree from Purdue or whatever telling her what to do. If Michelle was a guy, all this shit would not have happened to her."

"Egwu bụ ndụ m."

"We will, we will rock you We will, we will rock you."

"Buddy, you're a young man, hard man Shouting in the street, gonna take on the world someday You got blood on your face, you big disgrace Waving your banner all over the place We will, we will rock you, sing it! We will, we will rock you, yeah."

"There's no chance for us It's all decided for us This world has only one sweet moment Set aside for usWho wants to live forever? Who wants to live forever? Who dares to love forever Oh, when love must die?"

"When I'm gone, people will no doubt remember me for Queen, but I would much rather be remembered for attempting to change the way we treat our fellow creatures."

"Delving into my history, preparing for the imminent re-release of this epic, I have been a kind of father-figure looking back kindly on a young man who was fighting his way out of a kind of emotional black hole... For me, it’s been a nice thing to explore. Again, probably if Covid hadn’t have happened I wouldn’t have had the time... it’s been a discovery of where my brain was at the time."

"You're a shooting star I see A vision of ecstasy When you hold me, I'm alive We're like diamonds in the sky At first sight I felt the energy of sun rays I saw the life inside your eyes So shine bright, tonight you and I We're beautiful like diamonds in the sky Eye to eye, so alive We're beautiful like diamonds in the sky Shine bright like a diamond Shine bright like a diamond Shining bright like a diamond We're beautiful like diamonds in the sky"

"A shot in the dark A past lost in space Where do I start? The past and the chase You hunted me down Like a wolf, a predator I felt like a deer in the lights"

"You did not break me I'm still fighting for peace"

"I may cry, ruining my makeup Wash away all the things you've taken And I don't care if I don't look pretty Big girls cry when their hearts are breaking"

"I know that you think you've set sail when you call my name But I get it inside my head all day When I realize I'm just hopin' onto the hope that Maybe, your feelings don't show It feels like I only go backwards, baby, Every part of me says go ahead, I've got my hopes up again, oh no, not again It feels like we only go backwards, darlin' The seed of all this indecision isn't me, oh no 'Cause I decided long ago But that's the way it seems to go, When trying so hard to get to something real, it feels It feels like I only go backwards, darlin', Every part of me says go ahead, I've got my hopes up again, oh no, not again It feels like we only go backwards, darlin'"

"The idea of going to some flash studio where there's some stranger telling you how to arrange your song is pretty absurd to us."

"He was searching Blindly night and day This life, there must be more Breaking beauty, Just to stay awake His heart was like a stone"

"And on the last day He walked out in the sun He only just discovered the sun On the last day And on the last day When all his work was done He only just discovered the sun On the last day All this rapture Right here all along In scraps he tore away All this color In his final breath Exhaled the dark and gray"

"…The first girl I ever saw playing drums on television was Karen Carpenter, so I thought I play drums how come I don't have a television show?"

"People don't understand how important it is for funk to be funky, the only way to do that is to allow space to happen. Space is the most important part of music, it's the space that allows the song to breathe that's so important."

"We’d just sing a lot of things and sometimes slip in a little something here and there…There are no limits, there are no laws, there are no rules, we’re just gonna do whatever."

"…We had a great life together, we really did, good and bad, the ups and the downs, there were a lot of downs. But at one point I told him, “I’m not here to play your music to get paid because it’s money, money has nothing to do with it, I’m here because I love you. I don’t care about your money.”…"

"As an artist, I don’t like being able to be seen…If you’re having difficulty getting a part, it adds to the tension when the assistant engineer, engineer, producer and producer’s wife are hanging out. With the School-house, my engineer’s in the control room, and I could be doing vocals while stretching my T-shirt over my head and it wouldn’t matter. Everyone who’s worked here has gotten used to this nonvisual communication and actually found it to be advantageous. That’s what home studios are about — that funky thing."

"Creativity is an interesting thing…You can sit back, have a glass of wine, watch some television…and get a terrific idea of what you want to do…The great thing about being at home is that as soon as you get an idea you can put a mike at the piano and record it. That way you don’t lose the vibes, and you don’t have to worry about finishing before the studio’s next booking arrives…”"

"I'm the least technical person I've ever met...I hate anything with digital numbers on it. I just go by instinct. It's the same with a new AMS as it is with a synthesizer for me. I never read manuals. I just sit down with the thing for a couple of days and fiddle with the knobs until I figure out what it can do. And get what I like out of it. When it comes to producing too I just go for something that will jump off the record and into people's heads. Again, it's a question of what feels right. I try to make records which have a point of view to express and so you always have to concentrate upon the voice. When we did my album we tried very hard to keep the sort of R'n'B danceability in the vocals you'd expect from a D Train or Gloria Gaynor, but still keeping that Rock conviction you get from Foreigner."

"The bass suit was actually one of the first cordless guitars in existence, and I invented it. It was built right into this silver bodysuit so it looked as though the bass was coming out of my body, and the volume and tone knobs were on the sleeve...When it worked it was great, but the tunings were a little strange, plus I can’t tell you how many times I got shocked. It wound up being just one more thing that we had to worry about on tour: ‘Well, I wonder if this will work tonight.’ After a while I couldn’t stand wearing it anymore so I gave it up."

"In my mind, recognition has never been something to be obtained…I’m happy that more people appreciate what I’m doing, and are hearing my music. When I write, I communicate my own message, my own feelings and passion. I’m glad that they are being accepted."

"Sure. It does lean more towards the industry standard rather than towards my roots. But I meant it to be that way for a reason. To begin with this is my first album in about three years and my first for a new label. So I wanted the album to have the same basic listenability throughout and I wanted the record company to feel that they could hear four or five potential singles on it. Tracks that would work on the radio. Because that was what I was aiming for, I had to make sure that each song would capture an exact feeling which would get across to the most number of people. I always like to make records like that. I hate records where all the musicians or the artiste are really saying is 'Dig Me!' You can lose a lot of your potential audience by making self-indulgent statements. Unless, of course, you're so neat and groovy that people say 'Wow Man! Come All Over Me!'. Now I think I am pretty neat and groovy, but I prefer to make the sort of records which will make people think about themselves, not about me. Pop music shouldn't really express the innermost thoughts of the artiste as much as giving the listeners a feeling of exuberance or pain or power or whatever. To give them a sense of their own selves. Once you start making music with that sort of end in mind, you realise that you have to make it less jagged and more compartmentalised. And so the reason I Can Dream About You sounds maybe as Industry Standard as it does is because it was designed to get through to as many different sorts of people as possible. And that isn't necessarily a negative factor."

"...People get confused because they want the boxes your talent comes in to be always the same shape and the same colour. If you don't do that then people lose track of who you are. They say 'Oh, he doesn't know himself'. But I know who I am. The energy is the same, the expression is the same and the work diligence is the same. Always. It's just that sometimes it all comes in different boxes and different colours. It may be weird to some people but it surely doesn't bother me."

"It seemed to be a natural period when I wanted to stop doing pop records; it came with a falling-out between my record company and me...There was a hole in my career. Instead of a valley, it became a peak to me. I decided I was going to do something that I hadn’t really had time to do."

"I started reading books about the subconscious mind and intuitiveness, and what makes people tick when they hear songs that excite them, make them feel romantic or melancholy. I was in and out of bookstores and libraries. I read a lot of texts, including on primitive man and the workings of the way we emotionally react to things. It wasn’t scholarly or scientific. I read and skimmed and when I thought something was nonsense, I just moved on…"

"In a lot of ways this music is soothing. I think there’s a place for music that is peaceful and soulful unto the spirit. After plane bombings, AIDS and everything that has come upon us in this decade, I think we can use a little solace and reflection."

"I don’t necessarily do music for the pure art sake of my own self-expression, which is why a lot of people make music—to express themselves. I really feel that the work I do, be it writing, singing or producing, I do in order to help communicate feelings to other people, hoping they might feel the same things, that they somehow relate to it or get an experience from it that they can share with themselves."

"The reality of Andy Warhol’s 15 minutes is here, only if he were around now, he’d say “Now it’s five.” We’re going so fast, we don’t know what’s going on inside anymore. We’re becoming external, not feeling anything."

"I have a bit of anger about some things going on in the world that I know I want to sing about. I’ve never done that on a solo album before; they’ve been mostly about romance and relationships…The concept is Dan Hartman, so whatever’s happening to me when I begin to put out the feelings will be what the album is about. Whether I’m in love, out of love, or the next plane blows up…whatever, I just want to stay creative and hopefully keep people thinking and feeling…At least feel something."

"I think James Brown has made a lot of good records (in recent years)…But it was that purist James Brown thing that he was doing in the beginning and people won’t let him do that anymore because time marches on…That stuff is classic to me, but other people get bored with it. The challenge is to present something that is him, yet sounds fresh to listeners. That’s usually hard for (a veteran artist) to do. It helps to have someone step in from outside…I am proud of what we did on the album. I think it does present a contemporary James Brown. It’s not candy-coated. It has a lot of statement and a lot of heart."

"When you get into the areas of eroticism, politics, and belligerency, you have to be careful. Some of it will get out. Both Charlie and I have slanted minds. If “Relax” or “Sugar Walls" can be hits, there is a place for that kind of stuff, too. It's fun and interesting to write about that. Or with politics: Third World people own the bomb. That's probably where the nuclear war will start. They have nothing to lose. You can write about that. It'll be just another record from a romantic cynic."

"They said the scene was going to be patriotic, with the flag and Apollo fighting the Russian, and it had to be pro-American. We said we didn’t really want to go flag waving. We just wanted to have a good time, write a funky number and sing about America."

"I realize all you need to do is do it. I think we all restrict ourselves in our lives from doing things. We have choices and alternatives."

"I started producing before I even joined the Legends—around 1962... I produced some local R&B, rock and gospel acts at Baldwin Sound in Mechanicsburg [Pennsylvania]. People would hear what I'd done on someone else's record and call me up and ask if I'd produce them, too. I even wrote and recorded an advertising jingle for Sutliff Chevrolet out on Paxton Street when I was 16. So it's always been something that I could fall back on throughout my career--to keep my mind going, to keep me musically inspired, and to keep me moving without having to make statements of my own…"

"Dan was the first person I enlisted for The Edgar Winter Group. It was a huge talent search; I listened to hundreds of demo tapes to choose talented people for what I wanted to be the quintessential American rock band...The thing that I loved about Dan was that he had a youthful innocence and enthusiasm. He loved commercial music, and he didn’t have to try to be commercial. He had a natural ability to come up with simple ideas that were never overdone...he was originally a guitarist...I had to talk him into playing bass. He was a multi-instrumentalist like myself, but he was not a virtuoso player. Yet he would always find the right part to complement the song. Rock solid, and with the right groove. As well as being a great songwriter, he knew what to play and when to play it."

"Dan always liked to have a lyric before he wrote a melody and created a track. He reasoned that he needed to know the essence of the song in order to inspire his creative process. As a result, we would discuss an idea and I would then write lyrics. Often, I would throw out some lines or titles before proceeding to ensure that Dan agreed on the direction. If he concurred then I would go on to complete a lyric. Dan was very tough and uncensored in his assessments but our dynamics allowed for this. Being satisfied with the final work was all that mattered. However, because of his unvarnished critiques, I developed a system wherein I would write many alternative lyrics so that Dan could have choices."

"...This guy was so multi-talented. We would wake up and come down to the den and hear somebody playing like Hendrix, with the amp low-tuned. He could play like Hendrix. And then he’d sit down at the piano and play all these Elton John songs. He loved the Philadelphia Soul — that’s why you can hear it in “I Can Dream About You.” He loved The Spinners, and all those guys. He was like a sponge; he soaked up all those influences. And it was amazing to see the guy be such a virtuoso at every instrument — singing, playing, producing, piano, guitar..."

"Working with Dan was like going to an institute of higher learning in pursuit of a PhD in the art of collaboration. Before this, I had been the lead singer in bands and expected to write the lyrics, and it had been expected for those lyrics to express my experience and worldview. That had been my job, and, for the most part, no collaboration had been necessary...which opinion was better or worse did not enter into the dynamic, because we both understood that our sensibilities were not the same, and that, left alone, either of our opinions might or might not have worked, but the point of the collaboration was to create a work that was Hartman and Midnight, not Hartman alone or Midnight alone..."

"Somebody asked him to write a song for Aretha. You would get a demo that sounded like, you know, Aretha! If you asked him to write a song for Barry White, you’d get a demo that sounded like Barry White. He was brilliant at that."

"I have always found poetry and beauty in the church attributing central stage to a female presence who works on our behalf. I am a devotee of the Virgin to whom I always dedicate part of my prayers."

"To be able to interpret a piece, I have to fall in love with it. First and foremost, it must fill me with emotion so that I may do the same for those listening to it, even when I’m not composing the music or the lyrics, if I accept to sing a piece, it is because it reaches my heart and at that point it becomes a part of me, it’s my own."

"I only arrived in the world in 1988, by which point you were already seeing many of the great things happen and by the time I started going clubbing it was all about jungle It was great fun, but a hostile environment. It wasn’t a place for a gangly, 6-foot-5-inch, mousy-haired, scarf-wearing twat like myself. More a place go and do shed loads of cocaine and try and start a fight. But I loved the sound system. The culture of taking sound systems around really interested me, and when dubstep broke, that was it."

"I would be spooning my 6'8" boyfriend. I'm the big spoon, obviously. He'll love that I said that."

"I must say that I tended to rise to the occasion more when there was a programmatic theme, and you can start to visualize things easier that was as opposed to going from one tune to another, without ever getting anywhere. If you are thinking about writing a suite then it's more of an inspirational challenge I think. I must be honest and say that I did those four Moon Suite pieces very quickly. It wasn't unusual for everything to be last minute and I was constantly finishing off the last one for the copyists to be able to bring it to the studio half an hour before the end of the session."

"Your connections and the relationships you maintain basically guide you through your career and they grow into the music that you hear."

"We didn’t have a lot of money, but my parents asked me if I wanted to play the violin. My older brother plays country music and I was supposed to go into that... A path to classical music usually starts with privilege. There needs to be a certain level of income so you can afford an instrument and private lessons. [Where he grew up] classical music education was exclusively in the cities. Sometimes, you’d have to drive three hours to find a high school orchestra."

"I heard that you don't do favors for the mob but do you treat the devil the same?"

"I use drum triggers on the kicks, but not on the other drums–otherwise you just sound unnatural, like a machine. [...] For the blast beats, timing is all important. Practice slowly and build up to full speed so you can insert fills and rolls. Keep your lower extremities loose, too. Kick back, breathe properly, and let the sticks do the work."

"If anything, moving your limbs as a drummer keeps them lubricated. Look at Buddy Rich: He was whaling the hell out of his drums until he was an old man. Although it wasn’t metal music, he was doing blasts on the snare–he was a blastmaster!"

"I was always a metal head. [...] My influences back then were Clive Burr with Iron Maiden and Tommy Aldridge, who did amazing things with Ozzy Osbourne. And then when music started getting a little more extreme, I enjoyed Dan Beehler of Exciter, Gene Hoglan of Dark Angel, and, of course, Dave Lombardo of Slayer."

"Stuff [in the world] is just amazing. Whether somebody created it, I just don't know, maybe somebody did. Maybe it just worked out that way. Even if there is a God he don't give a shit. People think he's keeping track of everyone's individual lives but that's ridiculous. People have ideas implanted into their f---ing brains so early that, of course, they say, 'Oh, it's a lake of fire, it's eternal pain, it's being up to your neck in piss.' I personally think that when you're dead you're just moss in the ground. It's a sad reality but you're just a corpse and you're going to turn to dust."

"We were just kind of writing the record, and we were going over the songs. Me and Glen, we were, like, 'We wanna redo the songs.' It's like we had completed them — about nine or twelve, whatever how many songs. They were all right, but we weren't really psyched about them. So we decided to rewrite them. And Jack didn't really like it. And he kind of left one day and just never came back. So that was that. He's not on [the new album]. I haven't talked to the guy in almost a year."

"The whole point of Satanic music is to blaspheme against the Church. [...] I don't believe in or worship a devil. Life is short enough without having to waste it doing this whole organized praying, hoping, wishing-type thing on some superior being."

"Basically, if you’re a guitar player, there’s riffs that are going to come out. It just happens. It’s part of it. So we’re not lacking in inspiration. George (Kollias) is always playing drums, so he’s always got drum ideas. You know, (guitarists) Brian (Kingsland) and Zach (Jeter) are always playing. So there are always new guitar ideas. It’s not necessarily an endless well, and not every riff that we come up with manages to make its way into a song. That is where it comes from; we love to play music, so we’re always riffing. But, as soon as you try to dictate to the muse, it goes away. You can’t force yourself to be creative. You can be disciplined and work on your craft every day. That’s a little bit different. Not always is gold just gonna fall out of the sky, like when you hear a Nile record. You know that’s not just because we sat down in 10 minutes and said, “Okay, we’re done writing the record”. No, those songs took years to put together. A lot of blood, sweat, and tears went into taking the inspiration that we had and crafting it into something."

"People radically underestimate what it takes to try and take all that sonic abuse and turn it into something that you can listen to. It eats the mix (fast double kicks), and then you add some down-tuned guitars and some low screaming, growling vocals. How on earth do you hear anything?"

"I think we’re aliens. I think we’re not necessarily native to this planet. I think we came here from somewhere else, destroyed ourselves a couple of times, and what’s left after all that period of chaos, that’s what we have left, and that’s why no one knows where the fuck we came from. The early part of human history and civilisation is riddled with unknowns. Where did we come from? Where did these ideas come from? How do the Egyptians have such an advanced civilisation? Well, I think it came from before and just no one remembers. (The) last Ice Age, when the sea levels rose 400 meters. There’s a whole lot of stuff sitting out there, covered by water that we have no idea where the fuck it is. What was there? Just imagine if you took our sea level right now and raised it by 400 meters, how much of our current civilisation would then be underwater? So what happened at the end of the last stage? How do we know what was before the end of the last ice age? We only have a few things you know left. So you know, and how much shit survives 10,000 years of natural decay? Not much. Why do we still even know about the Egyptians? Well, they managed to build some shit that lasted 1000s of years, right? Otherwise, would we know anything about them? No, we wouldn’t; or it just be speculation, hearsay, and rumour."

"I didn’t get really exposed to metal until I was a teenager, but world history I loved from a very early age. I was in fourth grade and had to do a book report on Alexander The Great, and that just fired my brain up. My dad was always watching the epic flicks of the day like Ben Hur, The Ten Commandments, Land Of The Pharaohs, so it was a worm in my brain from an early age."

"The 80s were a lot of fun. It was a time where everybody had disposable income so everybody was always going out. There were half a dozen places to play in my home town. You could have quite the life playing four nights a week, even as a cover band, but after a while we wanted to write our own songs. You have to start asking yourself, ‘What is it I wanna do? What do we wanna sound like?’ It was a chance meeting with [ex-Morbid Angel frontman] David Vincent while we were playing Charlotte, North Carolina, where he introduced me to this whole universe of underground death metal that I was completely unaware of. That was the poison apple that I bit and it soon infected my entire band. [...] The vibe in the late 90s was that death metal was dead. We didn’t care though, because we were going to do whatever we wanted to do, the world be damned. We were from Greenville, South Carolina, which is a nowhere town. Already we had wrestled with the idea that probably no one was going to give a fuck, so let’s just do what we like and own it. We didn’t care about the ebb and flow of whatever is currently popular. [...] That mindset has helped us over the years, remembering who we are and why we’re doing what we’re doing. It’s humbling in a way that we are just some guys from South Carolina who are willing to work hard. We were happy that the timing of the universe then worked in our favour. You can’t complain - you just have to thank the metal gods."

"It became obvious to us early on that if you put in too many exotic elements, at some point it’s no longer really a metal record. Different Nile albums have had varying levels of extraneous elements to them. [...] It’s always a variable based on what each songs need. It’s the randomness of the universe."

"Sometimes the riffs, the ideas that are simpler, make a more direct connection and you can allow it to have that weight. Heaviness, doom, it’s a very elusive quality. If you get too tricky with it you lose that feeling of doom very quickly. It’s fleeting. It will run away, like a deer!"

"Georg Philipp Telemann was probably the most prolific composer in musical history. He wrote almost as much as Bach and Handel put together (and each of them wrote a perplexing amount) including 600 French overtures or orchestral suites, 200 concertos, 40 operas and more than 1000 pieces of church music."

"Chet Atkins was the man. Beloved of the generation of guitarists that went on to be the generation of the ‘60s, Chet was the titan of country music whose flatpickin’, acoustic-ripping playing would give anyone pause to stop, listen and admire. Responsible for creating the Nashville sound and bringing country into pop, as a guitarist his influence was felt far and wide. Solid as a rock, technically perfect, and an all-time great without compare."

"Much of the session work [Atkins] recorded and/or produced in Nashville with artists like Elvis Presley, Roy Orbison and the Everly Brothers laid the foundation for early rock and roll."

"First arriving in Nashville as part of an early '50s incarnation of the Carter Family, Atkins rose to the very apex of the Nashville music scene, helping to architect the "Nashville Sound" as a producer and executive, while recording a large discography of his own guitar work."

"Though comfortable playing many styles, Atkins was most often associated with country music and the acoustic guitar. [...] A guitar legend, Atkins was elected to the Country Music Hal of Fame in 1973. His musical contributions inspired artists ranging from Eric Johnson to the late Lenny Breau."

"If we’d like to be honest about gender in the music world, we need to address all parties. Women need to invest in themselves, hustle for gigs, network, and do the work of forming bands and cultivating their own talents if they would like to be taken seriously. The industry pretty much always rewards women who do these things. I’m not interested in any special handout just for being a woman. But on the other hand, if a woman is doing these things, yet she’s told ‘We already have enough women on the bill, so we’ll call you next year’—now that’s an issue. No one says to a male artist, ‘We already have enough men on the bill!’"

"The first woman to be featured on the cover of Flatpicking Guitar Magazine, Frazier’s talent as a guitarist is much respected in bluegrass circles."

"The original acoustic guitar hero, Bert Jansch was a player’s player, and you need only look at the list of people that count him as an influence to see that. Everybody from Jimmy Page and Neil Young to Pete Doherty and beyond cite Jansch’s distinctive and wide-ranging style as an essential ingredient in their playing. One of the true pathfinders of the ‘60s folk music, Jansch’s complex fingerpicking and dark, brooding songwriting established his reputation, and whether solo or with Pentangle he proved his boundless ability with an acoustic time and time again."

"Some folks thought Rahsaan Roland Kirk's playing multiple horns at once was a gimmick. Granted, the guy looked like a madman with all sorts of woodwinds strapped around him, with maybe a tenor sax or manzello and stritch (both obscure saxophones) in his mouth at the same time, but Kirk was a hell of an improviser, often harmonizing with himself. There's a live recording of Kirk playing "Sentimental Journey" on one horn and Dvorak's "New World Symphony" on the other, and Kirk said it's splitting the mind into two parts. "It's like making one part of your mind say, 'Ob-la-di' and make the other part of your mind say 'What does it mean'?" Not only was Kirk a damn fine saxophonist but his flute playing, while scatting, heavily influenced Ian Anderson of Jethro Tull."