I don’t write demographically. I don’t write a song to reach these people or those people.
My dad had a very difficult life, a hard struggle all the time at work. I’ve always felt like I’m seeking his revenge.
Every rock song is some variation of ‘Pull down your pants’
I always felt that the musician’s job was to provide an alternative source of information.
The only thing I know as I get older is that I don’t really need to be No. 1.
I never start with a political point of view. I believe that your politics are emotionally and psychologically determined by your early experiences.
Elvis is my religion. But for him, I’d be selling encyclopedias right now.
I believe the war on poverty is a more American idea than the war on the war on poverty. I believe that most people feel like that. And I believe that it ain’t over till it’s over.
Put your makeup on, fix your hair up pretty. And meet me tonight in Atlantic City.
Hey, little dolly with the blue jeans on, I want to ramrod with you, honey, ’til half past dawn.
Here everybody has a neighbor Everybody has a friend Everybody has a reason to begin again.
So let’s take the good times as they go and I’ll meet you further on up the road...
I walked a thousand miles just to slip this skin.
Let there be sunshine, let there be rain, let the broken hearted love again.
The highway is alive tonight But nobody’s kiddin’ nobody about where it goes I’m sittin’ down here in the campfire light With the ghost of old Tom Joad.
Sky of blackness and sorrow, sky of love, sky of tears. Sky of glory and sadness, sky of mercy, sky of fear.
You can hide beneath the covers and study your pain, make crosses from your lovers, throw roses in the rain. Waste your summer praying in vain, for a savior to rise from these streets.
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. You got to learn to live with what you can’t rise above.
Sometimes, at night you could hear the whole damn city crying.
Music was my way of keeping people from looking through and around me. I wanted the heavies to know I was around.