Play it f**kin’ loud!
A poem is a naked person… Some people say that I am a poet.
Sometimes it’s not enough to know what things mean, sometimes you have to know what things don’t mean.
I’m speaking for all of us. I’m the spokesman for a generation.
I think of a hero as someone who understands the degree of responsibility that comes with his freedom.
What’s money? A man is a success if he gets up in the morning and goes to bed at night and in between does what he wants to do.
At times in my life the only place I have been happy is when I am on stage.
For me, I started on a Les Paul and went through years of playing other guitars and just came back full circle to what was more natural to me.
The blues tells a story in itself. It can make you happy or give you a feeling to swing.
Early on, I figured out that when the top of a guitar is vibrating and a string is vibrating, you’ve got a conflict. One of them has got to stop, and it can’t be the string, because that’s making the sound. So in 1934, I asked the Larson Brothers—Chicago instrument makers—to build me a guitar with a half-inch-thick maple top and no f-holes. They thought I was crazy.
I’ve always had a deep love of live performance, it’s when I feel most alive.
Of course, there are a lot of ways you can treat the blues, but it will still be the blues.
Writing is allowing the musical idea to speak for itself.
However it goes, I’ll just keep playing. That’s where the basic satisfaction is at.
The only thing better than singing is more singing.
All this is saying is, OK I see now, the ‘hood does not quite want Shirley Bassey yet, so let me still give them this. Crack Music was made after Diamonds. After black people were like, ‘I don’t know about this one.’ It was like me reaching too high for the cookie jar.
My neighbors always listen to very hip Jazz… whether they like it or not.
The beauty of Jazz is that it’s malleable. People address it to suit their own personalities.
Sometimes it’s to your advantage for people to think you’re crazy.
Music allows the great opportunity to play with people you love.
Eliminating the piano means that I’ve always worked closer with the bass than most players.
The blues fitted in with the early 60s, the social way of life at the time.
