I'm glad there are a lot of guitar players pursuing technique as diligently as they possibly can, because it leaves this whole other area open to people like me.

I'm always making a conscious effort to be viable and accessible.

The best thing you've got going for you is individuality.

It's fun to sing sad songs. And it's fun to listen to sad songs. Enjoyable. Satisfying. Something.

To stand up on a stage alone with an acoustic guitar requires bravery bordering on heroism. Bordering on insanity.

I'm glad there are a lot of guitar players pursuing technique as diligently as they possibly can, because it leaves this whole other area open to people like me.

As the writer, you're always a presence in the song. If you get close to what human beings are like, you're writing about common experience. We all do much the same things, so if you nail somebody, then you've also nailed yourself.

I like the idea of playing in unison with yourself.

I try to make songs visual and tactile to kind of put you into the action.

I just like to entertain myself by sitting down and writing songs.

I probably wrote three-quarters of the songs without an instrument in my hands.

You want the audience to be uncomfortable.

What I wanted to hear didn't exist, so it was necessary for me to go out and create it.

The thing I do, really, is a communication with audiences more than any achievement through records.

I think the reason kids get into drugs and smoking is they don't have anything to do.

Well, first of all it's entertainment. That stops us becoming too pretentious or thinking we're great artists.

There's a part of me that wishes I'd never said one single solitary word on any subject publicly. Then I could have been the tortured poet, and there's so much mileage in that. But it's too late to stop now.

People want to hear about the extremes of human nature. They want things that are larger than their own lives, and more romantic, and not necessarily of their own experiences.

Amplifying acoustic instruments more than a little is really cheating, and everything becomes a compromise.

It's amazing what some people read into songs.

When you stand up acoustic in front of an audience, you really are a man without any clothes on. And that can be fun - it depends how much of an exhibitionist you are, I suppose. I quite enjoy it.

I try to look for the good in everybody, regardless of the way they're labeled.

I have to remind myself not to set boundaries.

I want people to come to my music without prejudice. I want them to get the music first. And who I am isn't that important. If they like the songs to me that's a good thing.

But music can save your life sometimes. It probably saved me from working in a bank or something. That's a kind of salvation right there.

All audiences should be slightly off balance.

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.

Except for a few guitar chords, everything I've learned in my life that is of any value I've learned from women.

I told my father I wanted to play the banjo, and so he saved the money and got ready to give me a banjo for my next birthday, and between that time and my birthday, I lost interest in the banjo and was playing guitar.

I just like simplicity. I like simple songs, I like simple chords, simple vocals, simple lead guitar. I just like simplicity. That's just the way I like it.

I took the rhythm place, which a lot of people didn't know how to do the way I could, and this was really the first time that Johnny had a rhythm guitar player.

Dorsey played the upright bass and steel guitar, as well as acoustic guitar. Johnny played acoustic guitar and together they were fabulous songwriters and singers.