“When you get the money, you still need to keep going; you don’t stop. There has to be something else. I think it’s the freedom to do what you want and to live your dreams.”

Trumpets are a bit more adventurous; they’re drunk! Trumpeters are generally drunk. It wets their whistle.

I’m only 49 years old. I’m still in the middle of this whole thing. I don’t feel like it’s finished at all. I’m still planning to write better songs.

I think [Transcendental Meditation] is what people need. They don’t need high minded talk, they need results.

Be cool and you’ll be alright. That’s rock & roll religion.

There will be an answer. Let it be.

Every time I felt low, I just put on an Elvis record and I’d feel great, beautiful.

Painting is a magical process that I like, where you conjure something out of nothing; you get a little idea that leads you through. You can go into a trance while you’re doing it, so it’s a nice contrast to real life.

And what’s the point of changing when I’m happy as I am?

At the end of the Beatles, I really was done in for the first time in my life. Until then, I really was a kind of cocky sod.

I realize now that taking drugs was like taking an aspirin without having a headache.

When you got a job to do, you got to do it well. You gotta give the other fellow hell.

Animation is not just for children – it’s also for adults who take drugs.

I love the past. There are parts of the past I hate, of course.

When I write, there are times — not always — when I hear John (Lennon) in my head, I’ll think, OK, what would we have done here?, and I can hear him gripe or approve.

If children are studying the 20th century, I’m in their text books.

Bend like the willow, winds gonna blow you hard and cold tonight. Life as it happens, nobody warns you, willow hold on tight.