Townes Van Zandt is the best songwriter in the whole world, and I'll stand on Bob Dylan's coffee table in my cowboy boots and say that.
America's criminal justice system isn't known for rehabilitation. I'm not sure that, as a society, we are even interested in that concept anymore.
My objection to the death penalty is based on the idea that this is a democracy, and in a democracy the government is me, and if the government kills somebody then I'm killing somebody.
To me, religion is an agreement between a group of people about what God is. Spirituality is a one-on-one relationship.
You know, I'm not comfortable with people whose politics are static in a democracy.
They say death and taxes are the only things that are inevitable. The truth is, you can not pay your taxes. I've done it, and there's consequences, but it can be done. Death you're not going to get out of, and you kind of got to deal with it.
New Orleans is a unique environment.
The singer-songwriter has always played music that was stylistically rooted in the '30s and the Great Depression and the Dust Bowl. But the fact of the matter is that none of us remember the Depression firsthand.
My dad was in a wheelchair and on oxygen for the last few years of his life.
The drama teacher that I had in high school, back in Texas, was the only teacher who didn't kick me out of his class. He turned me on to 'The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan.' I had picked up Dylan with 'Bringing It All Back Home,' and he turned me on to the first couple of albums, which I hadn't heard.
In New York, I'm around a lot of the reasons I started playing music in the first place. I live right behind Matt Umanov Guitars. I live on the street that Suze Rotolo and Bob Dylan were walking down on the album cover. I recognize the history.
The human race survived the Inquisition. We can survive. It's like the Anne Frank quote: 'In spite of everything, I still believe that people are basically good at heart.' Given what happened to her, it's one of the miracles of the world that she said that.