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I hear many extra-musical things somehow in Coltrane.

When you think about John Coltrane, in my opinion - and I think I share this opinion with a lot of people - his approach to music changed other people's approach to music.

In America, for a brief time, people who followed Coltrane were studied and considered important, but it didn't last long. The result is that the kind of music I played in the '60's is completely dismissed in this country as a wrong turn, a suicidal effort.

I wanted to make somebody feel like Coltrane made me feel, listening to it.

Motion Picture Soundtrack on Kid A was another Coltrane inspiration.

It wasn't until I got out of the Army and I heard Coltrane's record 'Coltrane,' when he was doing 'Inch Worm' and 'Out of This World,' that I thought, 'Oh my God, you can do that?' And then I thought, 'OK, I better go back and listen to Eric Dolphy a bit.' And then I said, 'Hmm, I better pull out these Ornette Coleman records.'

I think John Coltrane is one of the great American heroes, like Abraham Lincoln and Emily Dickinson.

Coltrane came to New Orleans one day and he was talking about the jazz scene. And Coltrane mentions that the problem with jazz was that there were too few groups.

Lately, I've been listening to some jazz albums. I love the new Pat Metheny album. John Coltrane. I still like good metal, though!

Coltrane was moving out of jazz into something else. And certainly Miles Davis was doing the same thing.