I try to be a guide for people, to make their darkness bright and to make the pathway light, and never to condemn or control or criticize.

I've never gotten money from most of those records. And I made those records: In the studio, they'd just give me a bunch of words, I'd make up a song! The rhythm and everything. 'Good Golly Miss Molly'! And I didn't get a dime for it.

We all have a darkness within us, it stems from our past. When we can forgive ourselves and not worry about what other people think, we can begin to walk in the light… When we live in today we can have our brightest future.

And even in the darkest destitute, you'll find traces of hope in the people who travel deep into the wreckage with you, shining their light to help guide you back home.

Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.

Black people lived right by the railroad tracks, and the train would shake their houses at night. I would hear it as a boy, and I thought: I'm gonna make a song that sounds like that.