I just want to thank all my fans for their loyalty and support-for coming out to the shows and buying the CDs.

The most profound, tangible influence in my life has been my wife, Monique. I don't know that I would even be alive were it not for her, and I certainly would not be the person that I am today.

There's a bootleg album that was recorded when I was 14 or 15, a compilation of things live at different clubs. Songs like Girl from Ipanema and Cry Me A River. I don't know what the title of it is.

When I did it with Johnny, it was almost a telepathic kind of communication.

I hadn't realized the number of people that are still interested in listening to what I am doing, people I would never know about if not for being online.

I just want to thank all my fans for their loyalty and support-for coming out to the shows and buying the CDs.

I really had little interest in becoming famous. When I write my book, it will be my guide to avoid becoming a rock star.

I can't imagine anything more worthwhile than doing what I most love. And they pay me for it.

We started out when I was 6 years old. We played ukuleles and sang Everly Brothers songs.

As far as I'm concerned, blues and jazz are the great American contributions to music.

Music is very spiritual, it has the power to bring people together.

But when I played Woodstock, I'll never forget that moment looking out over the hundreds of thousands of people, the sea of humanity, seeing all those people united in such a unique way. It just touched me in a way that I'll never forget.

I believe that blues and jazz are the two uniquely American contributions into music.

I get really tired of hearing of all these old rockers whine and complain about how hard life on the road can be. Just stop if you don't like it. I don't think of it as work. I love it all.

I guess that I'm primarily thought of as a rocker, largely because of 'Frankenstein' being such a heavy song - you know, it was really hard rock, almost a precursor of heavy metal and just the image of the synthesizer. I happened to be the first guy to get the idea of putting a strap on the keyboard.

I liked the more sophisticated urban style of blues like Ray Charles and B. B. King, Bobby Blue Bland, Lou Rawls; people like that with more of a tendency toward jazz.

I love music more just in and of itself. I love harmony and rhythm.

I played Woodstock in '69, and it really changed my life. Without a doubt, it was the single event that really changed the way I felt about music. Up to that point, I hadn't really thought of myself as more serious musician, and I didn't really have that much interest in pop music.

I started out playing ukulele when I was 5 or 6 years old.

I think The Doors are one of the classic groups, and I think we're all tempted to feel like the time in which we grew up was somehow special, but I really do believe that there were two golden eras in music: The Forties and Fifties of big band, jazz and swing, and the Sixties and Seventies of rock. To me, they're really unparalleled.

I'm primarily thought of as a rocker, and certainly 'Frankenstein' had a very dramatic power rock image. It was almost a precursor of heavy metal and fusion. But I also love jazz and classical and if there's one common thread that runs through all my music, it is blues.

I've always considered myself something of a musical rebel.

So yeah, I am definitely a blues man at heart.

There is a real formula to writing music, verse, chorus, verse, chorus, bridge. It's very formulaic. The subject matter that you can address in pop music is somewhat restricted. It just doesn't allow that same emotive quality that you can put into poetry.

There's just no telling what I'll do. But I can say for certain I will continue to play, record, and put out music.

When I did 'Frankenstein,' the record company said, 'Now you can do 'Dracula' and 'Wolf Man' and we'll call the whole thing Monster Rock!' and I said, 'No, that's not going to happen, I'm not going to do that.' I kind of enjoy defying categorization. I love music in and of itself. I love the beauty of harmony and rhythm.

When I was first starting out, you'd have to bang an old upright piano and stick a mike in it and it would always feed back and you could never turn it up loud enough to be heard and I would beat my hands black and blue and bloody.

I ended up buying a restaurant. Already we had invested in a gas station and a metal products plant.

Whether I'm doing music or I'm walking down the street or I'm in a record store buying a record or I walk into a comic store and I'm buying comics or having a drink with my friends, it's the same me.

But the real focus should be on people who are buying today because the base is so big it will take a long time for any change materialize on an overall basis.

A book worth reading is worth buying.

A surprising number of government committees will make important decisions on fundamental matters with less attention than each individual would give to buying a suit.

I think the big force is going to be consumer buying power.

Programmers and marketing people know how to get into your subconscious - they spend millions of dollars researching colors, shapes, designs, symbols, that affect your preferences, and they can make you feel warm, trusting, like buying. They can manipulate you.

Anyway, in the mid 80's I was spending a fortune buying old Golden Age books from the late 30's and 40's and I was making personal appearances at a lot of sci fi and comic book conventions all around the country here so that I could find books for my collection.

We're constantly buying airplane tickets; we travel on the Concorde.

Why are people unemployed? Because there is no work. Why is there no work? Because people are not buying products and services. Why are people not buying products and services? Because they have no money. Why do people have no money? Because they are unemployed.

Here is my general approach to the energy companies. You have already charged the utilities a 50 percent credit penalty for the power they were buying from you. You're charging us a penalty. You're not going to get two bites of the apple here.

Recently I've been collecting Star Wars figures again. When I was a kid I couldn't afford them. Now I can so I've been buying them and keeping them in their box for a later date when they'll be worth a lot of money.

I've tried everything. I've done therapy, I've done colonics. I went to a psychic who had me running around town buying pieces of ribbon to fill the colors in my aura. Did the Prozac thing.

People weren't buying as many records. My record company did not want me. I went through three record companies, went on tour at the wrong time. It destroyed me.

Country fans need to support country music by buying albums and concert tickets for traditional artists or the music will just fade away. And that would be really sad.

I was in Tower Records in San Francisco a few weeks ago, buying some cassettes, and a couple of people recognized me and ran up with albums, and I just wanted to cover my face and have a seizure or something. I want people to just go away.

In the area we're discussing, leadership begins on Madison Avenue, on the desks and in the offices of people who spend hundreds of millions of dollars buying what will get them ratings.

Many a man thinks he is buying pleasure, when he is really selling himself to it.

Credit buying is much like being drunk. The buzz happens immediately and gives you a lift... The hangover comes the day after.

You don't want too much fear in a market, because people will be blinded to some very good buying opportunities. You don't want too much complacency because people will be blinded to some risk.

Most of my friends from college became dental hygienists or went into retail, a lot went into sales. They all started getting married and having kids and buying homes and I was still living like a college student.

Whenever you're successful you owe that success to the people in the community, because they are the ones buying your product.