The only reason to write a new song is because you're tired of the old ones.

Anybody can play. The note is only 20 percent. The attitude of the motherfucker who plays it is 80 percent.

It's not the note you play that's the wrong note - it's the note you play afterwards that makes it right or wrong.

If somebody told me I only had an hour to live, I'd spend it choking a white man. I'd do it nice and slow.

It's not about standing still and becoming safe. If anybody wants to keep creating they have to be about change.

In music, silence is more important than sound.

I'm always thinking about creating. My future starts when I wake up every morning... Every day I find something creative to do with my life.

Knowledge is freedom and ignorance is slavery

Do not fear mistakes. There are none.

Sometimes you have to play a long time to be able to play like yourself.

If you sacrifice your art because of some woman, or some man, or for some color, or for some wealth, you can't be trusted.

Some secrets are heavy because they aren't yours to tell.

It was a sin. Kissing a guy who wasn't betrothed to her was wrong in every way. Everyone knew that. It was haram. Forbidden. You would go to hell for that...

I must have truly been under his spell, believing anything is acceptable when you're in love.

Romantic Orientalism was fascinated by the color and excitement of a powerful culture, and nearly always approached its subject with love.

It was an utterly phenomenal achievement.

The lives of most men are patchwork quilts. Or at best one matching outfit with a closet and laundry bag full of incongruous accumulations. A lifetime of training for just ten seconds.

Nobody is in a position to decree what should make a fellow man happier.

Ya'll don't hear what I'm preaching. I'm preaching so good I'm about to 'Amen' myself! Oh!...Oh God! I'm preaching good! Hallelujah!

Knowledge is potential; action is power.

I have long gone about with a conviction on my mind that I had a work to do-a Work, if you like, with a great W; a Purpose to fulfil; ... a Great Social Evil to Discover and to Remedy.