Motivation has always been a fascinating factor when considering a touring artist, especially when the years stack up. What keeps one out there year after year?

I don't know if music has ever achieved anything past appealing to the people that it appeals to. If a song could stop a war, then Bob Marley and Bob Dylan songs would have stopped one or two.

Ramones music has a Pavlovian effect on me - the song starts, and the world blurs around the sound.

Citizens United didn't work. Hey, Koch brothers, Karl Rove, Shellgame Adelson: Democracy trumps money sometimes.

I'm not harmful, just introspective. You can probably think I'm weird, but it's not harmful weird.

It's one thing to buy a copy of 'Atlas Shrugged.' You actually have to read it to get anything out of it.

Some people see Black Friday as a much-needed break for their wallet. I see it as retail outlets showing the customers the full weight of their contempt. The frenzy to buy cheap crap from China, the human downgrade of people fighting with each other over items they can probably live without, to me, is an insult.

All my big heroes are literary, writers.

I was very lucky to have had the opportunity to tour with the Beastie Boys and watched almost every set they played on all those dates. Why not? You do your set and then you get to see the Beasties play? Best deal in town.

I'd like to talk to Arnold Schwarzenegger, 'cause I live in California and I just want to see that canned, chemical filled body in my office.

I would like to become a better photographer. I'm working on that.

'Duck Dynasty' is a ridiculous show, and long may it wave. America and democracy will endure. They've seen a lot worse.

If American forces leave Afghanistan, the Taliban is going to do what to America? Don't say you're worried about what they will do to the Afghan people. If that was America's concern, America's operational presence there would be much different.

Fish is the only kind of respirating thing that I consume. Everything else I don't want any part of.

Before the Civil War, the Southern states were selling a lot of cotton to England and didn't seem to mind British occupation. By and large, the Revolutionary War wasn't at all great for business.

Most poets are elitist dregs more concerned with proving their skill with a dictionary than communicating ideas with impact.

In the summer of '84, you just couldn't escape the Born in the USA record.

As a young person, I wanted everyone to agree with me.

If there is one set of laws, one Constitution for every citizen, its protections hopefully applied equally to all, then why do the results seem to differ so radically? What do you call that? Look around - you're living in it.

As performers grow older, I reckon there are two ways they can go. They can either be up there, playing more deeply from their guts than ever, or they can be phoning it in so crassly that it leaves a lump in your throat as you leave the venue at the end of the show.

When a band becomes as truly iconic as the Velvet Underground, there will often be a box set released, overburdened with mediocre material that dilutes what was fine left on its own.

You want to meet a bunch of really friendly people? Go to a Slayer concert. There'll be some real psychos there, but most of those people will take care of each other.

The perpetrators of the actual bad stuff that does real and lasting harm to people, like leakage of industrial chemicals into water systems, seem to get not so much as a second glance; the bloviation from media pundits and think tanks creates false problems that waste time and energy debunking.

You could split hairs and bring up words like 'doo-wop' and terms like 'soul' or 'R&B', but I think pop music is what you want it to be - that's why it's pop.

The kid who throws his spaghetti from the high chair onto his father's face, he's pushing back. He's sticking it to the man as he sees it. I like that. So that is punk.

If you listen to 'The Revolution Will Not Be Televised,' by Gil Scott-Heron, that album is dripping with rage.

I was at the first Minor Threat show, and you could tell, 'This band is going to be the king of the town.' It was obvious. They were so good.

The best compliment I get every year is that a band will write me and say, 'We were just on tour, and we had people coming to our show saying they had never heard us before they heard us on your show.'

Sometimes when you meet a musician you are a fan of, and he or she isn't the friendliest person, you walk away from the experience wondering if you will ever be able to listen to their music again.

I was happy to find out that when on tour, Dolly Parton doesn't use hotels but stays on her bus every night, to the point of having her buses shipped from Austria to Australia so she can tour the way she sees fit. I used one of her buses once - an honor.

I'd like to talk to Sean Hannity in a controlled environment and say, 'O.K., you can't interrupt and jump up and down like a professional wrestler.'

Let's pretend my career in music is a bell. Whether you like my music or not is up to you. But you've got to admit I rang that bell pretty hard and pretty often.

One of the most prevalent and undermentioned genres of music is what is known as noise. You can find it all over the world happening in basements, small venues and even some festivals. Often blown off or belittled by critics, the form for the most part goes unheard and unnoticed.

Everything I do, writing, touring, travelling, it all comes from the punk and hardcore attitude, from that expression - from being open to try things but relying on yourself, taking what you have into the battle and making of it what you will, hoping you can figure it out as you go. Make some sense of it.

To me, the real 'state of the union' is found in how Americans react to current events.

Pride is a thing that I have tried to abandon completely. Try as I might, pride still creeps into many of the things I do.

I never thought I was right for TV or that TV was right for me.

A lot of Americans don't have a passport, never will have a passport. Not only will they not travel, they don't want to travel.

I have always maintained that Iggy Pop is the Heavyweight Champion of Rock & Roll.

So, one way or another, I found myself in a few movies. I take it seriously when I'm on the set, but I don't take myself seriously as an actor.

I'm not into fame. I'm not into making money, outside of financing my books. I'm not into status. My thing is basically about time - not wasting it.

If I hear, 'Be afraid of Tehran,' I'm like, 'I'd better go to Tehran.'

Nelson Mandela will always be the face of South Africa. The traveler passing through the country will see Mandela's face almost everywhere he looks. Truly, the man is omnipresent.

I'm a big fan of the American Tapes label. But that's very hard to keep a grip on that because you blink your eyes and they've released three records, all of which are limited edition, all sold at one show. So you have to follow in drips and drops on eBay, which I do.

I think it's fantastic when the young enrage their elders. I really do believe that if it's too loud, you are indeed too old, and that if it has been standing for too long, it needs a thorough inspection.

For me, returning to Los Angeles annihilates the memories of where I have just been with an astonishing speed.

If I were a doctor, I would prescribe that you addict yourself deeply and irrevocably to music and never, ever seek cure outside of more music. It really is the best drug available.

To anger female voters in America is to tread on the tiger's tail. Women turn out in huge numbers, and they are well aware of how their bodies work and what they need.

But I have a good life. I enjoy what I do. I am married to work.

The truth is an anti-war statement in itself.