RY COODER

If something grooves and you like the sound, then that's all you need.

I went on tour with Ricky Skaggs and his wife, Sharon White, and the White Family in 2015. It was fantastic. They're all the greatest singers of that country stuff, traditional country up into bluegrass.

The blues is so expressive - nostalgic but not sentimental, mournful but not pathetic, so humble and close to the earth. It's a nuance-filled thing.

Having my son on drums has made a huge difference. I can't stress this strongly enough, in terms of the groove space and style that Joachim gave me to instinctively play what I felt in a more free way, rather than feeling constricted. That's true on record and on stage.

People respond to any good you can do in music.

Travelling is hard. I'm no traveller. I hate flying, and I hate hotels.

I've listened to blues my whole life. I know it, I play it, I understand it.

The Woody Guthrie 'Dust Bowl' tunes were really fascinating.

The story of American pop music is the story of failure. The blues, country music, it's not the story of success. People don't win; they lose.

It's crazy to make records nobody buys. It's just a waste of time.

If you're white working with non-white people, you will be branded as a colonialist by some people, regardless of your efforts or intentions.

I can't help what people write or think. If somebody thinks I'm a serious archivist, they're wrong. That's been a problem. It's a shame people take that attitude, because it affects how they listen to the music. It's a big mistake to treat any pop music that way.

How many BMWs do you need? How many Rolex watches you gonna wear in your lifetime, for crying out loud? What is it about that kind of desire? I don't understand it.

I've done a fair amount of commercials. I did a bunch of Champion spark plug ads and Levi's and Molson Beer. You wouldn't know it. But some of it's damn good.

I think all the music I do, which ties together, as far as I'm concerned, is fun and entertaining.

I always have felt that most people don't have the first idea about what musicians, in the traditional sense - I don't mean in the modern media fake way, but traditionally - what they went through, what their lives were like.

If it hadn't been for record people like Ralph Peer, the Chess brothers, and Alan Lomax, then life would've been unbelievably dull, and I would've been sacking groceries somewhere and probably, at this point, running a little 7-Eleven down by the airport.

The ocean is very comfortable. I could never live inland.

Nat King Cole - I listen to him a lot.

Sure, immigrants will do work that no-one else will do. There was even a movie about it - 'A Day Without Mexicans.'

On any given day, if I play the guitar, I can put myself somewhere. I always thought, 'This is the way you go.' It's like a magic carpet, see?

I don't understand the public, but I do believe the public is oversold and underrated every day. Give the people something interesting, something to chew on, I say.

I always thought East L.A. music was so dreamy and languid and kinda greasy.

It's good to see more young people playing instruments.

To me, the Internet is a big scam.