"The hardest thing to do is to do a simple song. It's easier to be in a prog band. Really. Because you're not playing the game of 'memorable,' you're playing the game like jazz, of showing off. You don't expect somebody to walk out of a jazz concert humming [sings a jazz horn line with many notes]. You don't expect that."

"So the hardest thing to do and you have to respect the art of it, if it's a Bruno Mars tune or, you know, whoever, is that hearing it once and the melody — especially the chorus — sticks. And the art of that, it just happens. Like all these musicians, The Beatles and whoever you like, Lennon, Jagger/Richards, can't read a stick of music. I can't read or write music. Nobody could. Hendrix couldn't read or write music. No, you just do it. It's like being able to write a book in another language, although you can't read or write in another language because it's verbal."