Unless you go forward then you are going back.

When you play music with someone who has a heart rather than playing with someone who is just doing it for money or is cynical it makes all the difference.

I just got a call one day from Ringo asking me if I wanted to go out on the tour. It was as simple as that. He was putting together this band and he heard of me in the context of doing this and he gave me a call. I jumped at the chance.

Unless you go forward then you are going back.

When you are in a band for a number of years you loose your identity in a way. You become a part of that band and then all of a sudden you are not part of that band. You are still the band without the other two members.

I feel with ELP that I wasn't making the most of my life and I wasn't making the most of my creativity. I was marking time. I don't want to do that. Life is to short.

The early ELP albums were pioneering in a way.

Making a comeback is one of the most difficult things to do with dignity.

When we made that album with Gary Moore, I was still kind of searching for the right direction for myself. Although the music is quite good the direction was like a box of fireworks that caught light all at the same time.

As I said to Ringo, I was in a successful Rock N Roll band. He was in a band that changed the world. That's the difference.

Philosophically, what I have learned is to thy own self be true. That is the biggest lesson of all. Relax; music is fun. To many people take it to seriously because of the money involved.

There is no standing still because time is moving forward.

I would like to involve myself in some black music. I would like to do some blues and some gospel music. I want to try stuff from other genres and try to widen my musical base.

The greatest music is made for love, not for money.

I don't think art is a goal orientated business. I don't do things for the challenges, I only do them because I love them, I'm not really a goal orientated, achiever type of person.

Certain things you learn through exposure. It's really the elements which make up any artist. You really learn by example. You learn by influence. And some people have a huge impact on you, and that's how you become the artist you are.

I love touring in the United States. It's dramatically different wherever you go. North to south, you're going from snow to palm trees.

I picked up the guitar at 12 yrs old - basically, my mother and father bought it for me for Christmas. I played one at my friend's house; when I say played it, I just played around with it at my friend's house. It just struck me as something I really wanted.

It's true when they say songwriting is 10% inspiration and 90% perspiration. In truth, what happens is... songs comes through you.

Most of my career has been about standing on a stage performing music to an audience, and once the show is over, they go home and I go on to the next show.

Music is an emotional experience, and that is what imprints itself on the soul. And I think for me, any great art is art which communicates human emotion.

Progressive music probably wouldn't even really exist if not for the people of the United States having picked up on it and nurtured it in the way they did. It really is an American form of music in the sense that it was nurtured here. So it belongs here. It has become part of the fabric of American musical culture.

Songs are like children. They are all special to me - you can't just pick a favorite. Of course, 'Lucky Man' was a special tune with a wonderful story behind it. They have all done different things.

The less people that are on the stage, there's more drama. You start living the music with each individual. When you see a band with ten people on stage, just a huge ensemble, you don't know who's doing what.

What I learned then was there is a certain power in a three piece band. The more people you put on that stage, the more diluted it becomes.

When I was writing my autobiography, these songs came up from time to time which were important to me, and I realized that what they really represented was, they'd come from this age of shared music.

You often hear people say 'Luck is self made.' I think it is, to a certain extent; if you work hard on something, you are more likely to be lucky than if you don't. That having been said, I do believe during in my career I have been at the right place at the right time with the right people.

What's good for the goose is good for the gander.

Even more than dying itself, I'm scared of the horror-movie changes that happen to the human body as it ages. I think of it as a sort of haunted-house effect, living inside a crumbling, creaking structure that is full of ghosts and will, some day, fall down.

I did actually like school. When I was 17, I was in college, but before that, I was home-schooled. I was very social. I liked to know everyone.

There are a lot of unseen elements to having a successful singing career.

We live in a material world, not a dramatic one. And truth resides not in melodrama, but in the precise measure of material things.

Bob Arum and Don King can do their thing but if I fought for those guys and they put the money up like they are supposed to then I don't have a problem.

A bad father has never a good son.

I don't know whether crime is dictating business or business is dictating crime.

Unless you know a lot more about something than I do, I am not really that interested. I have too much information already.

Just as a cautious businessman avoids investing all his capital in one concern, so wisdom would probably admonish us also not to anticipate all our happiness from one quarter alone.

I can answer anything about any American pop culture song ever.

Everyone wants to lead when things are going well.

I think it's also safe to say genre TV and movies were a big influence - the first stories I ever tried to write were Godzilla fan fiction when I was in elementary school, complete with elaborate maps of Monster Island made with multiple sheets of typing paper and nearly six feet wide. I kind of wish I still had those.

There is nothing in the dark that isn't there when the lights are on.

And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life?

The world only exists in your eyes. You can make it as big or as small as you want..

I personally believe this: We have only today; yesterday's gone and tomorrow is uncertain. That's why they call it the present. And sobriety really is a gift... for those who are willing to receive it.

Do as the heavens have done forget your evil With them forgive yourself.

I do like to work with young directors because it's such a difficult business that I think after directors have been around a while sometimes, not always, but sometimes their passion gets siphoned off because they get hurt.

After college, I drove across the country twice with friends. It was one of the most fascinating experiences of my life. I find it really inspiring seeing the country that way.

Be thankful and joyful. Be content with life. Make the most of every situation.

I do talk about celebrity relationships like Kim Kardashian's. I like to find the humor in love.