JOHN LEE HOOKER

All my life I been doin' what people tell me to do. Now, I'm telling them.

I hitchhiked, took trucks 'n' trains - anything that would pick me up. I stopped in Memphis for about six months and they found me and come got me. Stayed about a month an' split again.

The way Will Moore taught me, and the way I play it, the blues is just something different.

I don't do nothing I don't want to do.

If they played more blues, people would just get it - they try to hold it back but just about can't hold it back now because the blues is really going.

In my career, people in the record business have been rockin' in the same ol' boat. They all crooks - I'll say it clear and loud - especially the big ones.

But I don't want to do no big tours or go out on the road.

My style is all to myself.

I am a happy man. I've had a good life.

I like dropping into a small club and playing with some people, trying to help them get a start.

I just get an idea and then all of a sudden I've got a song.

It don't take me no three days to record no album.

You can go to Europe, and there's no turnin' back - any parts of Europe. Wherever you are, there is no stop and go for the blues. The blues go but it don't stop.

I have heartaches, I have blues. No matter what you got, the blues is there. 'Cause that's all I know - the blues. And I can sing the blues so deep until you can have this room full of money and I can give you the blues.

They wasn't gonna give you nothin'. I didn't care as long as they let me play my music. Cash on the spot... You cheat me and I'm gonna get me some money, too.

The one thing the blues don't get is the backing and pushing of TV and radio like a lot of this garbage you hears. They choke stuff down people's throat so they got no choice but to listen to it.

The blues tells a story. Every line of the blues has a meaning.

I remember back in Detroit, I used to go to the Apex Bar every night after I got off work. The bartender there used to call me Boom Boom. I don't know why, but he did.

I don't think about time. You're here when you're here. I think about today, staying in tune.

I've got enough money to live me two lifetimes so I don't have to do nothing I don't want to.

I don't play a lot of fancy guitar. I don't want to play it. The kind of guitar I want to play is mean, mean licks.

I like the small clubs.

I went on to Cincinnati. I had got a taste of the big cities and them bright lights. I stayed there until I was about 18 or 19 and then I went on to Detroit.

I want to play music when I want, write a song if I want or watch a baseball game if I want.

Groups are corporations now. They have pension plans. Musicians have saw the daylight.