How could I have been anyone other than me?

I can't believe that we would lie in our graves wondering if we had spent our living days well. I can't believe that we would lie in our graves dreaming of things that we might have been.

I'll lean on you and you lean on me and we'll be okay.

It is criminal to put our servicemen and women in harm's way and to put the lives of so many civilians on the line for the misguided frustrations of the Bush administration.

Tomorrow is no place to place your better days.

We've never played at this place before. This place is big, and I'm kinda nervous, so we're going to make it feel small by pretending we're in a... bedroom. We'll hang off the edge of the bed, take off our shoes and get naked!

Take what you can from your dreams, make them as real as anything.

How could I have been anyone other than me?

A friend is always good to have, but a lover's kiss is better than angels raining down on me.

I fear that our true motivation is about oil and our own flailing economy; about the failure to destroy Al Qaeda and about revenge.

You wear nothing but you wear it so well.

Good music is good music, and everything else can go to hell.

A guy and a girl can be just friends, but at one point or another, they will fall for each other... maybe temporarily, maybe at the wrong time, maybe too late, or maybe forever.

Being able to scream at the top of my lungs in front of people is very therapeutic. It is a great gift for me to be able to do that.

For me, in songwriting, I have a route I can take. Maybe there's some forks, I can go this way, this way. But I know those roads. I still have the experience behind me.

I definitely like the oddballs. There's a song called 'Little Thing,' which is the only song that I have recorded that has no words. And it's the one that I get past my critic inside me.

I do still get shocked every once in a while when I catch my reflection when I'm walking past a glass building, but it's in my mind about getting older and finding out what I'm going to look like as it unfolds - or as it folds, depending on where the marks and scars land.

I don't believe in trickle-down economics. I don't think that people who have the most are inclined to share it, generally.

I don't think everything is going to get peachy ever. But I think we have to fight for what we believe in.

I found there's a fairly blatant racism in America that's already there, and I don't think I noticed it when I lived here as a kid. But when I went back to South Africa, and then it's sort of thrust in your face, and then came back here - I just see it everywhere.

I never went to college - I barely got out of high school.

I think I am a very kind person. I think I'm joyful, but I could be kinder and I could be more joyful. I do believe peace is a state of grace, and not the absence of violence.

I think I'm probably a very sad man wrapped in a very joyful package, and I think I'm very resilient, and I think I'm quite generous, sometimes to a fault. And I'm very bad with money, but I don't see that too much of a flaw.

I think we should all talk to our enemies and talk to our friends. Talk! That's the only way we'll find solutions.

I use God in my songs a lot but I don't have a relationship. I don't know what that means.

I want to figure out a way to not be stupid with money, then make a whole bunch of it, then I want to move to Outer Mongolia. I want to milk a yak. Maybe I'll just settle for a cow.

I want to figure out a way to not be stupid with money, then make a whole bunch of it, then I want to move to Outer Mongolia. I want to milk a yak. Maybe I'll just settle for a cow. Can you milk a bison?

I was regularly advised not to go into music, that I should give up that foolish dream.

I'm a bit of a caveman - I don't go out into the digital space very often. I lie facedown on the grass and count how many bugs I can find.

I'm a fairly tormented artist, and I'm less willing to indulge myself in self-pity, outside of songwriting.

I'm familiar with that feeling of silence that comes with a very imminent catastrophe, when you know you have absolutely no control over a situation.

I'm partly obsessed by aging gracefully.

I've never been much of a craftsman, in an educated way. But I think just the experience of writing makes the avenues I follow a little more efficient in some ways. At the same time, when you're young, you're a little more fearless, and there's less of an internal critic.

If I find something I like, I'll chase it and see what comes out the other side. Once a song gets momentum and gets away from you, that's a good sign.

In so many areas of life, I'm a spaz and incompetent.

It's funny, I get a little quieter with time. I don't want to chase my tail and one day repeat myself and repeat myself and one day have kids going to college and not have memories that I should, because I was too busy doing my thing.

My songs are like a three-legged dog - you have to get to know them to have any love for them.

Nothing is black or white, nothing's 'us or them.' But then there are magical, beautiful things in the world. There's incredible acts of kindness and bravery, and in the most unlikely places, and it gives you hope.

So often we talk about saving the planet, but what we really mean is to save the planet the way it is, so we can live here. So that is can sustain us.

So often we talk about saving the planet, but what we really mean is to save the planet the way it is, so we can live here. So that is can sustain us. Because the planet doesn't need to be saved. It doesn't care if all the squirrels, elephants, and trees die and there's just a couple of amoebas floating around at the poles.

South Africa gives me a perspective of what's real and what's not real. So I go back to South Africa to both lose myself and gain awareness of myself. Every time I go back, it doesn't take long for me to get caught into a very different thing. A very different sense of myself.

Success turns a lot of people off. I have a pretty solid sense of joy and respect that irritates people, and can irritate me, too.

The idea of God as a fatherly figure who looks down on us and worries about how we're doing or takes sides when we have fights - it's more irritating than Santa Claus. The world and the universe are far more wonderful if there's not a puppet master.

The idea that we're somehow centrally important to the planet's existence is pretty comical - although I'd like us to be.

The reason I play music is to touch people - for selfish reasons, as well. It feels good to make someone else feel something, whether it's a kiss, a painting, good idea or it's a song.

The saddest part of the human race is we're obsessed with this idea of 'us and them,' which is really a no-win situation, whether it's racial, cultural, religious or political.

The world and the universe are far more wonderful if there's not a puppet master.

There's a freedom to being young that is harder to come by as time goes on.

There's war - there's always been war, as long as most of us have been alive. There have always been people being abused, there's always been horrible things in the world. Why are we outraged? We should just be quiet and figure it out, and work it out together.