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I was listening to music long before rock 'n roll.

When I talk about rock n' roll, to me, that goes back to the beginning of the 1950s. Blue suede shoes and sideburns, man. Pink and black coloured clothes. Turn your collar up, comb your hair in ducktails. And the music was cool. It was a whole culture then - a different world.

I think a lot of people came into rock n' roll to try to change the world. I came into rock n' roll to make music.

I was born at the beginning of rock and roll. I got to experience the entire evolution of popular rock and roll music even before it started.

Right around the end of the fifties, college students and young people in general, began to realize that this music was almost like a history of our country - this music contained the real history of the people of this country.

The music we made then was so amateurish, compared to the rest of mainstream pop or rock and roll. But what differentiated us from what everybody else was doing in the business was the fact that you could tell that these people came from different reference areas.

America is tough for rock music. Rock n' roll used to be the main music for the youth, and it's not so much anymore. It's hip-hop and stuff.

Rock and roll's relatively new, in the sense of the Fifties, Sixties, right? They invented the first sort of rock stars, and they took it to excess, and then the excess became bitter, tormented. Then it became okay to succeed.