To write a good song, an artist has to drawn from reality. There has to be some spark from realism that communicates a real feeling to someone else. You have to be real. Or you have to be a really good storyteller.

I returned to upstate NY where I just laid in bed for days with a fever that just wouldn't go away. After more of this, I grew increasingly sure that this was not simply the flu!

This illness made it impossible for me to give my best effort to our audience, but now that it's been identified, I'm looking forward to a complete, quick recovery and to get back out there with John as soon as possible.

Like all soul singers, I grew up singing in church but sometimes I would leave early and sit in the car listening to gospel band, The Blind Boys of Alabama. Hearing their lead singer Clarence made me connect the idea of church and show business and see how I could make a career singing music that stirred the soul.

I love antique architecture, so if I have any indulgences, I have owned and renovated and reconstructed a lot of old houses.

I'm just about the best singer I know, and it's time for everybody to say that. I have total facility with my voice. And for some weird reason, critics don't talk about it.

I have to say I have never been comfortable with somebody else telling me what to do - in any way.

I've always been a guy who likes to stretch my limits - to find out if I have any, really.

When you're playing in front of people, everything is external. It's all going from you out to an audience. When you're in a studio, it's very internalised, it's going from the air through you into this meticulously crafted, layered piece of work.

Nixon was the beginning of people not trusting politics.

I've got a sense of humor. I'm a funny guy.

Late 20th century music was a really important thing. It changed the world, and I'm part of that, and now I'm part of the museum that celebrates that.

You don't have to be a good singer any more if you can rap well.

When I was a kid, I always looked up to people like B.B. King and Ray Charles.

Reject what you don't want. Get rid of dead wood.

If Paul McCartney tells me that so-and-so song is his favorite song, what do I care? What do I care what anybody else says?

I have gone from one relationship to a marriage and stepchildren.

Most artists try to avoid cliches, but it's pretty hard to avoid them if you yourself end up being one.

Racism is a cancer. Black people have been dealing with this ever since we landed on these shores in shackles and chains. If we've been doing it for that long, those of us who are impatient need to be a little more patient and keep on addressing those things, not ignoring it. White people need to do the same thing. Don't turn a blind eye to it.

I came into music kind of late in life - until I was 17 I wanted to be a spy, wanted to be James Bond, so I had to learn rather quickly and practice longer than most people did to play catch up.

If you were to talk to somebody from Georgia you would understand what he's saying, he wouldn't sound like your next-door neighbor in Montana, but other than that it's the same language, just with a few little different nuances. That's just like country and blues, or blues and rock 'n' roll. They're the same music with different accents.

Hate cultures are not a thing of the past. They're a continuing problem and one cannot blame presidencies for this. Racism in the U.S. began way back, before the time of Abraham Lincoln.

I met a white man once, who claimed that every black man has a gene which makes him violent. To which, I said I had never been violent and that he was wrong.

I have been attacked and mistreated for my skin colour since I was a child.