When they were putting oil rigs up and down the California coast, the whole issue of safe energy and the addiction to fossil fuels really came into focus.
The women’s movement resurgence of standing up for so many things that were kind of sleepy there for a decade or so, there’s been a reawakening and I think the consciousness movement in general is dovetailing with a lot of recovery and self-empowerment.
When you love a song so much you have to sing, you know how you feel – it releases something in you that resonates as true, whether it’s James Brown or Joni Mitchell.
I’m glad I get singled out for my slide guitar-playing, which isn’t that difficult to do. I didn’t take guitar lessons, but I just love the way it sounds, almost like the human voice.
The generation I grew up in was the beginning of “stand up for yourself,” whether being a singer-songwriter or a feminist. In my college years, the feminist movement was really coming to fore, so we wouldn’t have put up with guys treating us less than equal.
We did a two month tour with Taj Mahal that was really healing and cathartic and a good distraction after my brother passed away. Then I knew I wanted to take a year off, and it was really nice to have that chance to fall apart.
Pat Benatar might need a rock band, but I can just sit with a blues guitar for an hour and a half and do folk songs and great contemporary ballads, and not many people can pull that off.
I’m proud of the way I rearrange and put things together, like a chef who makes a great meal, or a filmmaker who puts together a story – it’s casting, editing, cinematography.
I don’t want to discredit people’s opinions of me, but you talk about the violin or the cello or lead guitar where you have to learn tons of chords, that’s much more difficult.
I have been really heartened by how much coverage there has been about inequality of pay across the board, between the entertainment industry and almost every industry worldwide.
