I've looked at photographs of myself during concerts and it sometimes looks as if I'm in a fencing move, with a guitar in my hands instead of a sword.

Song Sung Blue took a lot of compressing and refining, and it has one of my favorite lyrics.

I've always thought of music as something which gives the words their flight and their wings and the music often comes first, although sometimes I'll have a concept, a title idea, a lyric idea that I want to write and the lyric will come first.

I think probably Australians have just a little more taste than most people.

I still need practice in enjoying the fruits of success.

If it can affect me, if it has meaning to me, if I feel I can do it well, I will do it and record it and thats why I recorded these songs.

I've looked at photographs of myself during concerts and it sometimes looks as if I'm in a fencing move, with a guitar in my hands instead of a sword.

Songwriting is different from music, although I don't deny now that it would be nice to have a little more background in music theory.

No, I majored in biology, in a pre-med program.

When you're on a merry-go-round, you miss a lot of the scenery.

Because my musical training has been limited, I've never been restricted by what technical musicians might call a song.

It's very difficult for me to say 'I love you' but to sing 'I love you' for me is easier.

The main objective in any song, the songs that I write, has always been that it reflect the way I feel, that it touch me when I'm finished with it, that it moves me, that it can take me along with it and involve me in what its saying.

Performing is the easiest part of what I do, and songwriting is the hardest.

I don't like all of the music to be serious and deadly.

Songwritng is what I do.

Brooklyn is not the easiest place to grow up in, although I wouldn't change that experience for anything.

Chelsea Morning is a great Joni Mitchell song and I guess I'm partial to her lyrics because they show me a slightly different perspective on life.

There's a mystery to writing, and you don't really know where most of it comes from.

I came back to performing with a different attitude about performing and myself. I wasn't expecting perfection any more, just hoping for an occasional inspiration.

Songs are life in 80 words or less.

I'm lucky. Hard work is the key, but luck plays a part.

I don't feel I have to write deep and meaningful songs; they can be light and meaningless. It has to do with the place I am in my life, a really good place.

I like having a woman. I like having someone to come home to, to make all of the hard work feel worth it. I need someone with me. And I want someone.

I may have a little bit of a talent for music, but I've learnt to tap into my own self when I write. When I put the drill bit inside my heart, sometimes I come up with something light and frothy, sometimes with something deep and painful, but it's great to connect with the audience.

I used to go to my kids' soccer games and I was the only parent who wasn't screaming, because I'd have to do a show that night. It was hard. Moms and dads get more emotional at those soccer and Little League games than at a professional game.

I'm throwing myself back in because I like being married. I don't want to end this whole fabulous journey alone. I want someone by my side who I love and who loves me. I've finally found somebody who's up to the task of being my wife, because I'm very high maintenance.

It was a real hand-to-mouth existence in those early days - I'd have whatever dry cereal there was in the house for breakfast, 30 cents to spend on lunch and a hot dog for dinner. I did that for years. So there was definitely a hunger in me, of various kinds, to succeed.

The cardinal rule for any performer is that they should know themselves before they enter the spotlight, and I didn't. I was just Neil and I did what I was supposed to do. I was supposed to get married, so I got married. I was supposed to get a job, so I looked for work.

When I need my wife or when I need companionship or someone to talk to, I need it, like, now. So my wife will have to give up whatever she's doing at that moment to tend to my needs. And, in the same way, I would tend to hers. That's not such an easy thing to do.

You can't plan to write a great song. It just happens to you. It drops in your lap. It's the same thing with a woman.

I had given up the guitar between '75 and '78. I completely lost interest. I was sick of hearing other guitar players and I was tired of my tunes.

Every time the guys were knocked out by my guitar playing and the girls were knocked out by the type of songs I did. That set us apart from the average blues band.

I play piano and guitar. Acoustic guitar. I tried studying classical guitar when I was 16 but it got really hard. I could never play a lead to save my life.

Oh yeah, I mean, it wasn't a very good guitar, most good guitars have got thrust rods in the necks that you can adjust or that'll keep them in shape, you know keep them straight. This one just, well it turned into a bow and arrow after a couple of months.

In OK Computer, the guitar was already moving towards a tone generator as well as a riff generator.

Cool things happen. Ace's guitar flies through space, goes through a hole, and blows up. I throw drumsticks and they come flying at you.

Yes, I took up the guitar when I was about 14 or 15, in high school.

I keep a guitar around while writing and will improvise music. I do this for several reasons, such as that it's fun, and sometimes it helps me with the meter.

I like to play guitar, jam out, play the blues, go watch movies. I love movies.

Arranging is the way I put my stamp on my music as much as my guitar playing.

Look what venison does to a goofy guitar player from Detroit? I'm going to be 54 this year and if I had any more energy I'd scare you.

An uncle of mine emigrated to Canada and couldn't take his guitar with him. When I found it in the attic, I'd found a friend for life.

Because I don't play guitar any more, African harmonies and rhythms have been an inspiration to me. I love the raw origin of the sound. It complements my voice and words naturally.

I think its so cool that you can pick up the guitar and create something that didn't exist 5 minutes ago. You can write something that no ones ever heard before. You have music at your fingertips.

So, my big brother was playing guitar and I figured I'd try it too.

I don't understand why some people will only accept a guitar if it has an instantly recognizable guitar sound. Finding ways to use the same guitar people have been using for 50 years to make sounds that no one has heard before is truly what gets me off.

I didn't want to get attached to one guitar; I didn't want to have an instrument that was irreplaceable.

I don't really know why I chose bass except that it was different than guitar.