The beginning of it starts at the end.
It’s cold out there, colder than a ticket taker’s smile at the Ivar Theatre on a Saturday night.
I’ve lost my equilibrium, my car keys, and my pride.
The Music was like Electric Sugar.
I walked 500 miles just to see a halo, when I opened my eyes I was blind as can be.
Well you say that it’s gospel, But I know that it’s only church.
It’s hard to win when you always lose.
As a kid, I did want to be an old-timer, since they were the ones with the big stories and the cool clothes. I wanted to go there. Now, I guess I want to bring that with me and go back in time.
My reality needs imagination like a bulb needs a socket. My imagination needs reality like a blind man needs a cane.
I guess I’ve always lived upside down when I want things I can’t have.
I always liked the idea that America is a big facade. We are all insects crawling across on the shiny hood of a Cadillac. We’re all looking at the wrapping. But we won’t tear the wrapping to see what lies beneath.
For a songwriter, you don’t really go to songwriting school; you learn by listening to tunes. And you try to understand them and take them apart and see what they’re made of, and wonder if you can make one, too.
I do like books on anatomy. I have to say I’m an amateur physician, I guess.
George Bush is a fan of mine, he came to see me in the Seventies. His coke dealer brought him.
Music has generally involved a lot of awkward contraptions, a certain amount of heavy lifting.
I don’t go to church on Sunday, don’t get on my knees to pray, or memorize the books of the Bible, I got my own special way.
Well, it’s either kiss me or kill me, that’s how I see it.
George Burns was a Vaudeville performer I particularly loved.
Most songs that aren’t jump-rope songs, or lullabies, are cautionary tales or goodbye songs and road songs.
Don’t you know there ain’t no devil, it’s just god when he’s drunk.