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These Days, My Main Guitar Amps Have Been Magnatone. They're Beautiful. Magnatones Have Actual Tremolo, Which I Recently Learned About Guitar Amps. Often What Guitar Amps Call Vibrato Is Really Just A Volume Up And Down. But Magnatone Has A True Vibrato, Which Is Pitch Bending. And So, It's Just A Lush Sound.

-Ani DiFranco

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These Days, My Main

Ani DiFranco

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These Days, My Main Guitar Amps Have Been Magnatone. They're Beautiful. Magnatones Have Actual Tremolo, Which I Recently Learned About Guitar Amps. Often What Guitar Amps Call Vibrato Is Really Just A Volume Up And Down. But Magnatone Has A True Vibrato, Which Is Pitch Bending. And So, It's Just A Lush Sound.

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Smile Pretty And Watch Your Back

Having More Exposure Is Kind Of A Bittersweet Thing For Me, Honestly, Because It's Nice To Have A Little More Job Security In Life Now.

These Days I Keep A Journal, So I'm Constantly Sketching Down My Thoughts, Or Lines That Come To Me...ideas For Songs. And Then When I Have A Moment To Myself, I'll Sit Down With My Guitar And Open My Journal, And Start Kind Of Massaging Things Together, And See If A Song Takes Shape. Or Sometimes, I'll Just Be Hanging Out With My Guitar And Come Up With A Chord Progression Or A Lick, And That'll Sort Of Sit Around For A While Waiting To Marry Itself To Some Words. So It's Sort Of Haphazard And It's Like...junk Culture. I Go Around Finding Shiny Objects And I Glue Them Together Laughs.

And If There's Anything I Do It's Change And Grow. I'm Just A Living Being. Every Year Of My Life I Seem To Learn That Everything I Know Is Wrong.

I'll Walk The Plank And I'll Jump With A Smile, Cause If I'm Gonna Go Down I'm Gonna Do It With Style.

I Think I'm A Very Solitary Person. To Actually Not Be Anonymous Is A Bit Claustrophobic For Me.

I Did Not Design This Game; I Did Not Name The Stakes. I Just Happen To Like Apples; And I Am Not Afraid Of Snakes.

The Fundamental Imbalance That Is Behind All Of The Other Social Diseases Is Patriarchy.

Patriarchy Is A Fundamental Imbalance Underlying Society And It's One We Rarely Address Because It's So Universal. But As I Get Older, I See That Peace Is A Product Of Balance.

Somedays The Line I Walk Turns Out To Be Straight - Other Days The Line Tends To Deviate.

My Life May Not Be Something Special But It's Never Been Lived Before.

Something Special

If I'm Gonna Go Down I'm Gonna Do It With Style. You Won't Hear Me Surrender, You Won't Hear Me Confess Cause You've Left Me With Nothing But I Have Worked With Less.

I Am A Thinned-skinned Type. I Am Very Sensitive, Very Emotional. Vulnerability Is Kind Of Always A Part Of My Day.

If You Turn On The Tv, You're Going To Get A Certain Palate, And If You Go Looking Underneath The Surface, There's A Whole Lot Of Stuff There That I Think A Lot Of Our Generation Would Be Really Interested In.

Let's Show Them All How It's Done, Let's Do It All Imperfectly.

One Of My Rules Is: Never Try To Do Anything. Just Do It.

I Fight With Love And I Laugh With Rage....you Gotta Live Light Enough To See The Humor, And Long Enough To See Some Change.

Like How Could You Do Nothing, And Say, 'i'm Doing My Best.' How Could You Take Almost Everything, And Then Come Back For The Rest? How Could You Beg Me To Stay, Reach Out Your Hands And Plead, And Then Pack Up Your Eyes And Run Away As Soon As I Agreed?

These Days, My Main Guitar Amps Have Been Magnatone. They're Beautiful. Magnatones Have Actual Tremolo, Which I Recently Learned About Guitar Amps. Often What Guitar Amps Call Vibrato Is Really Just A Volume Up And Down. But Magnatone Has A True Vibrato, Which Is Pitch Bending. And So, It's Just A Lush Sound.

And God Help You If You Are An Ugly Girl Course Too Pretty Is Also Your Doom Cause Everyone Harbors A Secret Hatred For The Prettiest Girl In The Room And God Help You If You Are A Pheonix And You Dare To Rise Up From The Ash A Thousand Eyes Will Smolder With Jealousy While You Are Just Flying Back

Who Says I Like Right Angles? These Are Not My Laws, These Are Not My Rules.

I Basically Get Stereotyped A Lot In Terms Of Being A Girl And Writing 'chick' Music For Teenage Girls Or Something. I Think, If Anything, The Press Kind Of, Because Of My Gender And My Age, Tends To Kind Of Relegate My Work To This Sort Of Special-interest Group. It's Part Of The Cultural Dynamic, I Guess.

I Seriously Hate Pop Music And All Things Super-commercial.

What I Like Way Better Than Lgbt In Terms Of Labeling Sexuality Actually Is A Scheme That Comes To Me From My Friend Animal Prufrock Wherein One Is Identified Not By What They Supposedly "are" But Rather By What They Are Into. Which Brings Us To The Terms Hemosexual, Shemosexual, And Mosexual.

Patriarchy Is Like The Elephant In The Room That We Don't Talk About, But How Could It Not Affect The Planet Radically When It's The Superstructure Of Human Society?

Subtract Out The Impact And The Fall Is All You Get. So Here's Two Beers To Remember Why And Three More To Forget.

Men Make Angry Music And It's Called Rock-and-roll; Women Include Anger In Their Vocabulary And Suddenly They're Angry And Militant.

Feminism Is Not Only For Women It's Something Everyone Can Participate In, And Evolve Together, As The First Step In The Right Direction. I See Feminism As A Tool To Achieve That Balance And Peace.

Before Katrina, You Didn't See Criticism Of The Bush Administration In The Media. Here They Are, Stealing Elections, Enacting Illegal Wars, Huge Crimes Against Humanity And Democracy, And You Didn't Even See Criticism. It Wasn't Until Katrina That People Started To Come Down On Them.

I Cannot Name This, I Cannot Explain This, And I Really Don't Want To So Just Call Me Shameless.

Love Isn't Over When The Sheets Are Stained.

My Mother Was A Feminist, And She Gave Me Some Tools Of Self-possession And Self-empowerment, But Now That I Have Lived Here For Forty-three Years, It's, Like, Whoa, There Is Just So Much More To Do, Other Than Become Myself. I'm Still Talking About It. I Still Drop The P-word, "patriarchy," On Unsuspecting People In Everyday Conversations.

I Don't Care If They Eat Me Alive, I've Got Better Things To Do Then Survive.

Some People Wear Their Smile Like A Disguise. Those People Who Smile A Lot, Watch Their Eyes. I Know 'cause I'm Like That A Lot. You Think Everything's Ok, And It Is . . . 'till It's Not.

There Are So Many Things That We Have To Be Very Concerned About. But I Always Come Back To Feminism. People Look At Me Sideways Now And Are Like, "with Everything Going On, The Destruction Of The Environment, These Endless Wars, This Capitalism That Has A Stranglehold On Our Culture And Our World And You're Talking About Feminism Still?"

I Love All Those Great 'f' Words - Feminism, Folk Music.

I Found Religion In The Greeting Card Aisle Now I Know Hallmark Was Right

[amy Ray And I] Both Have This Part Of Our Brain That Makes Us Think That Everybody Should And Will Be Nice And Friendly And Forthcoming. And Then We're Completely Disillusioned. We Have All These Grand Plans. One Of Them Is The Rolling Thunder Pussy Revue. There's All These Women's Festivals Going On This Summer, And We Don't Think They're As Adventurous As They Could Be. Lilith Fair-right Away, By The Name, You Know They Aren't Pushing The Envelope Hard Enough.

Sometimes The Beauty Is Easy. Sometimes You Don't Have To Try At All. Sometimes You Can Hear The Wind Blow In A Handshake. Sometimes There's Poetry Written Right On The Bathroom Wall.

We've Got Ego's Like Hairdos.

I Just See A Lot Of People Who Are Really Terrified Of The "f-word." A Lot Of Women These Days, A Lot Of Young Women Don't Want To Call Themselves Feminists.

When All You Can Think Of Is Your Own Personal Problems, You Have Nothing To Give To Your Society. If You're Trying To Figure Out Where Your Next Meal Is Coming From, You Can't Go March On Washington.

March On Washington

The Old Farm Roads A Four Lane That Leads To The Mall, And Our Dreams Are All Guillotines Waiting To Fall.

I Love To Exercise My Creativity In Many Ways But As Each Year Of Specialization Goes By I Feel Further And Further From My Other Creative Selves. I Used To Be Able To See Myself Doing Many Things And Sometimes I Still Long For A Job That Involves Less Pressure And Grappling With People But, As You Say, I Am One Of The Lucky Ones So I Try To Just Focus On Feeling Lucky And Carry On!

And Thoughts Of No Other Man But You Could Possibly Get Through The Picket Lines To Enter Into My Mind.

If You’re Not Angry, Then You’re Just Stupid, You Don’t Care. How Else Can You React When Something’s So Unfair?

What Bugs Me Is That You Believe What You're Saying. What Bothers Me Is That You Don't Know How You Feel. What Scares Me Is That While You're Telling Me Stories, You Actually Believe That They Are Real.

I Try To Laugh At Whatever Life Brings.

The World Is My Oyster. The Road Is My Home. And I Know That I'm Better Off Alone.

And I Try To Draw The Line But It Ends Up Running Down The Middle Of Me Most Of The Time.

My Political Mission Is As Acute As Ever. For Me, In Addition To Kind Of Looking At The World And Trying To Engage In My Society Politically, Having The Kid Around Sort Of Makes Me Check In With Myself. I Think You're All Busy Trying To Fix The World, But What About Yourself?

A Little Bird Told Me That Jumping Is Easy And The Falling Is Fun, Right Up Until You Hit Sidewalk Shivering And Stunned.

Strangers Are Exciting, Their Mystery Never Ends. But, There's Nothing Like Looking At Your Own History In The Faces Of Your Friends.

I Still Define Myself By The Places That I've Been.

It's The Ground That We Walk On, It's Where We Sit, It's The Language That We Use. It's A Difficult Undertaking, But I Think Without Healing That And Creating More Of A Balance Between The Sexes, We Will Never Have Balance Globally. I Feel Like I Am Going Deeper And Deeper Into This Space Where I Came From That I Barely Understood.

Why Do Our Kids Have To Show Us What Gun Control Is All About?

For Me, The Stronger Ground I Have In My Personal Life, Then The More Will I Have To Fight The Good Fight.

Fight The Good Fight

I'm A Little Hibernating Animal. Anonymity Is One Of My Favorite Things. I Mean, That's Why I Moved To New York When I Was Like 18, Because There, There Are Just So Many People That There's No One And You're Just Lost. You're Completely Invisible And I Find That Very Liberating.

To Split Yourself In Two Is Just The Most Radical Thing You Can Do

You've Decided To Love Me For Eternity, I'm Still Deciding Who I Want To Be Today.

So Many Of Us, Myself Included, Need To Keep Our Sense Of Personal Outrage In Check. Each Human Beings Position On The Planet Is One Of Intense Humility.

What Doesn't Bend, Breaks.

Emptiness Has Its Solace In That There's Nothing Left To Take.

There's A Certain Window Of Time In The Middle Of The Night Out In Middle America Where There's No Bar Open And Nothing On Tv. If You Don't Want To Do Too Many Drugs, You Have To Start Bodily Mutilation.

I Feel Like We Need To Understand Feminism More As A Tool To Mediate, Counteract, To Ultimately Defeat Patriarchy And Restore Balance To Our Government, Our Culture And Our Ways Of Thinking And Structuring The World. I Think We've Had A Very "masculine" Sensibility For A Long Time, And I Think We Need To Go Back To The Roots Of Social Imbalance. I Think We Have To Try To Right That First, And From There And All These More Pressing Issues Will Follow.

I've Been Saying The Occupy Movement Has Got The Ball Rolling, And Now We Need To Take The Fight To The Great Indoors!

Occupy Movement

I See A Lot Of Young Female Performers Who Do Not Call Themselves Feminist, But Would Certainly Believe In Their Own Right To Self-determination, And Wouldn't Want Anybody To Stop Them From Becoming Themselves. They Just Refuse To Recognize The Relationship Between Their Lives And Those Of Other Women, Or Feel Any Solidarity There.

For Every Hand Extended Another Lies In Wait. Keep Your Eye On That One Girl...anticipate.

Privilege Is A Headache, That You Don't Know That You Don't Have.

I Would Rather Have These Things Weigh On My Mind. At The End Of This Tunnel Of Guilt And Shame, There Must Be A Light Of Some Kind.

I Used To Be A Superhero; No One Could Touch Me, Not Even Myself. You Are Like A Phone Booth I Somehow Stumbled Into, And Now Look At Me - I Am Just Like Everybody Else.

I Want Somebody Who Sees The Pointlessness And Still Keeps Their Purpose In Mind; I Want Somebody Who Has A Tortured Soul ...some Of The Time

My Distraction's My Defense Against This Lack Of Inspiration Against This Slow Deflation Yeah The Further The Horizon The More It Holds My Gaze The Foreground's Out Of Focus But You Know I Kinda Hope It's Just A Phase Just A Phase.

But As Bad As I Am, I'm Proud Of The Fact That I'm Worse Than I Seem

They Can Call Me Crazy If I Fail, All The Chance That I Need, Is One-in-a-million And They Can Call Me Brilliant If I Succeed.

I Really Have Been Enjoying Performing More Lately Than I Have In A Long Time And You Know, It's All About That Sort Of Centered Feeling That I Have Now. You Know, Thanks To, Not Just My Kid, But Her Father Before Her. You Know, I Have A Kind Of A Grounding Through Them That I Really Relish, And I Think Is Also Good For My Work, You Know.

Don't Treat Me Like I Am Something That Happened To You.

Love Is A Piano Dropped From A Fourth Story Window, And You Were In The Wrong Place At The Wrong Time.

Any Tool Is A Weapon If You Hold It Right.

I Know Men Are Delicate Origami Creatures Who Need Women To Unfold Them, Hold Them When They Cry. But I Am Tired Of Being Your Savior And I Am Tired Of Telling You Why.

What Makes You So Lavish That You Can Afford To Spend Every Sober Moment Feeling Angry And Bored?

Unanswered Questions

I Was Attracted To A Lot Of Different Art Forms - Dancing, Painting. But There's Something About Music That People Hold So Close. It's Such A Powerful Art Form, And That's Why I Live For It.

A Lesson Must Be Lived In Order To Be Learned And The Clarity To See And Stop This Now That Is What I've Earned

I'd Rather Be Able To Face Myself In The Bathroom Mirror Than Be Rich And Famous.

Freedom And Democracy, That's The Word From Washington Every Day. Put America To Sleep With Warm Milk And Clichés, And People Are Expendable Along The Way.

I Am Getting Nowhere With You And I Can't Let You Go And I Cant Get Through.

The Way I Play Guitar Is Very, Very Hard And I Bloody Myself Incredibly Without The Tape. And The Nails Are My Picks.

People Who Are Just Starting Out Are Always Sort Of Coming To Me For Advice As The Example Of "independent Girl," And Lots Of People Ask, Well, How Did You Get The Booking Agent Or The National Distribution Or The Tours? And I Look At Them Like, "good Lord! Relax!" I Mean, How I Did It Was To Not Care About It And To Not Even Think About It For Years And Years. All I Thought About Was Getting The Next Little Gig In The Little Bar, And I Get This Sense That People Want Me To Give Them The Secret Formula Or The Magic Trick To Make It All Happen.

...words Are Some Of The Most Powerful And Important Things I Know....language Is The Tool Of Love And The Weapon Of Hatred. It's The Bright Red Warning Flag Of Danger--and The Stone Foundation Of Diplomacy And Peace.

I Know There Is Strength In The Differences Between Us. I Know There Is Comfort Where We Overlap.

Individual Differences

Birth Is The Epicenter Of Women's Power

Inspirational Pregnancy

We Can't Afford To Do Anyone Harm Because We Owe Them Our Lives Each Breath Is Recycled From Someone Else's Lungs Our Enemies Are The Very Air In Disguise You Can Talk A Great Philosophy But If You Can't Be Kind To People Every Day It Doesn't Mean That Much To Me It's The Little Things You Do The Little Things You Say It's The Love You Give Along The Way

I'm An All Powerful Amazon Warrior, Not Just Some Sniveling Girl.

There's A Crowd Of People Harbored In Each Person There Are So Many Roles That We Play.

It's Not Important To Be Defined, It's Only Important To Use Your Time Well.

It Seems That Different People Have An Idea Of What I Am, And What I Should Be. And Then There's Me.

Life Is A B Movie: It's Stupid And It's Strange, It's A Directionless Story, The Dialogue Is Lame, But In The 'he Said She Said' Sometimes There's Some Poetry, If You Turn Your Back Long Enough And Let It Happen Naturally.

I've Been Waiting For Sleep To Offer Up The Day With Both Hands.

People Used To Make Records, As In The Record Of An Event, The Event Of People Playing Music In A Room, And Now Everything's Cross-marketing, Its About Sunglasses And Shoes, Or Guns And Drugs That You Choose.

If You Like It, Let It Be, And If You Don't Please Do The Same.

You've Already Put More Than Enough Energy Into Worry. That's All Women Have Been Allowed To Do, Historically.

Well, It's Really Gratifying To Me To Have A Stage And Some Bright Lights And A Microphone. They're Tools And Opportunities, And To Be Able To Just Pull Somebody Up On Stage With Me And Point At Them Is A Great Feeling.

Squint Your Eyes And Look Closer I'm Not Between You And Your Ambition I Am A Poster Girl With No Poster I Am Thirty-two Flavors And Then Some And I'm Beyond Your Peripheral Vision So You Might Want To Turn Your Head Cause Someday You Might Find You're Starving And Eating All Of The Words You Said.

If You Think You Know What I'm Doing Wrong Well You're Gonna Have To Get In Line.

I Did A Lot Of Work With Myself Over The Course Of Being Pregnant And The First Few Months Of Being Pregnant. It's Nice, The Pace Of Being Pregnant; It Gives You A Long Time To Not Just Germinate A Baby But Germinate The Mother That You're Gonna Be.

Love Sets Fire To Your Schedule, And Then Calls An End To Time.

I Am Not A Pretty Girl. I Don't Want To Be A Pretty Girl. No, I Want To Be More Than A Pretty Girl.

I Am Still Praying For Revolution.

In A Man's World, I Am A Woman By Birth And After 19 Times Around I Have Found - They Will Stop At Nothing Once They Know What You Are Worth.

Why Do You Think I Write These Feminist Songs, To Try And Teach Myself To Respect Myself. You Know, It's Not Because I'm A Hero.

There Isn't Much I Have To Say, That I Wouldn't Rather Just Shut Up And Do.

I Can Jump Ship And Swim-- That The Ocean Will Hold Me, That There's Got To Be More Than This Boat I'm In.

You've Got Your Whole Life To Do Something, And That's Not Very Long. So Why Don't You Give Me A Call When You're Willing To Fight For What You Think Is Real, For What You Think Is Right.

Every Time I Say Something They Find Hard To Hear, They Chalk It Up To My Anger, And Never To Their Own Fear.

All The Decent People, Male And Female, Are Feminists. The Only People Who Are Not Feminists Are Those Who Believe That Women Are Inherently Inferior Or Undeserving Of The Respect And Opportunity Afforded Men. Either You Are A Feminist Or You Are A Misogynist. There Is No Box Marked "other."

If You Don't Ask The Right Question, Every Answer Seems Wrong -

I Sing Sometimes For The War That I Fight, 'cause Every Tool Is A Weapon If You Hold It Right.

I Mean, Playing Music At Home And Writing And Hanging Out With My Guitar Is Kind Of Medicinal For Me, But When I Bring The Songs To People On Stage, It's Very Joyous.

I Think It Is Very Useful To Know Ourselves, But When We Start Naming And Labeling, That Is Dangerous, That Gets Problematic. It Negates That Things Are Always Changing. Besides, It's Hard To Pin A Label Onto Something That's Always Moving.

I Envy Your Ignorance, I Hear That It's Bliss.

I Like To Be An Inspiration And An Example Of The Idea That You Can Be Independent, And It's No Problem, And You Can Pay Your Rent, And It's Empowering, And It's Great. And That's True, But It Also Takes A Really Long Time, And You Have To Have A Lot Of Patience And A Lot Of Conviction In Why You Want To Remain Independent.

Just Let Me Go, We Have To Be Able To Criticize What We Love, To Say What We Have To Say 'cause If You're Not Trying To Make Something Better, Then As Far As I Can Tell, You Are Just In The Way.

I Turned My Pain Into Art And My Hard Work Into A Career. Helping Myself Has Helped Others. Helping Others Has Helped Me.

My Songs Are Just Little Letters To Me.

The Scary Truth Is, You Have To Scratch Some Veneer Off To Gauge Where The Moral Fiber Really Is In Certain Pockets Of Society. It's Raw. It's Scary. But It Gives Us A Place To Work With.

Outside Sleep's Open Window, Between The Drops Of Rain, History Is Writing A Recipe Book For Every Earthly Pain.

Some People's Minds We're Not Going To Change. But If We Can't, We Need To Bring More Positive Voices Into The Discussion.

How Come I Can Pick My Ears But Not My Nose?

I'm An Atheist How Unfortunate It Is To Assign Responsibility To The Higher Up For Justice Amongst People.

When I Look Around I Think This, This Is Good Enough; And I Laugh At Whatever Life Brings Because When I Look Down, I Just Miss All The Good Stuff And When I Look Up, I Just Trip Over Things.

My Country Tis Of Thee, To Take Swings At Each Other On Talk Show Tv.

You Got To Look Outside- Your Eyes- You Got To Think Outside- Your Brain- You Got To Walk Outside- Your Life- To Where The Neighborhoods Change.

You Broke Me Bodily. The Heart Ain't The Half Of It, And I'll Never Learn To Laugh At It In My Good Natured Way. In Fact, I'm Laughing Less In General, But I Learned A Lot At My Own Funeral. And I Knew You'd Be The Death Of Me, So I Guess That's The Price I Pay.

When I Look Down, I Miss All The Good Stuff And When I Look Up, I Just Trip Over Things.

Fate Is Not Just Whose Cooking Smells Good, But Which Way The Wind Blows

We Have A Complete Void Of Progressive Politics In This Country Right Now. The Will Of The People Goes Ignored And Unrealized. I'm Searching For The People That Can Enter The Political System, A Strong Third Party. We Need To Consolidate.

How Come I Can Pick My Ears, But Not My Nose? Who Made Up That Rule Anyway? How Can You Say That's The Way It Is, That's Just The Way It Goes, Why Don't You Decide Fore Yourself What You Can Do?

When You Grow Up Surrounded By Willful Ignorance, You Have To Believe That Mercy Has It's Own Country And That It's Round And Borderless.

Art Is Why I Get Up In The Morning But My Definition Ends There. You Know I Don't Think Its Fair That I'm Living For Something I Can't Even Define.

Pop Stardom Is Not Very Compelling. I'm Much More Interested In A Relationship Between Performer And Audience That Is Of Equals. I Came Up Through Folk Music, And There's No Pomp And Circumstance To The Performance. There's No, Like, 'i'll Be The Rock Star, You Be The Adulating Fan.'

I Don't Know If There Are Artists Out There Who Love Their Own Records. I Haven't Met Any, And I'm Kind Of Extreme In The Other Direction, But Therein Lies The Impetus To Keep Working And Keep Making New Songs And New Records.

They See Me As A Symbol, And Not A Human Being. That Way They Can Kill Me, Say It’s Not Murder It’s A Metaphor.

I Believe The Act Of Giving Birth To Be The Single Most Miraculous Thing A Human Being Can Do And It Is Surely The Moment When A Lot Of Women Finally Understand The Depth Of Their Power. You Think It Can’t Possibly Be Done, You Think You Can’t Possibly Take The Pain, And Then You Do-—and Afterward You Look At Yourself In A Whole New Way. If You Can Do That, You Can Do Anything.

I Fear That Donald Trump Will Continue To Be Followed Around By The Media In Its Totality As He Continues To Rail Against Hillary Clinton.

Science Chases Money, And Money Chases Its Tail, And The Best Minds Of My Generation Cannot Make Bail.

I Am Not An Angry Girl, But It Seems I've Got Everyone Fooled. Every Time I Say Something They Find Hard To Hear, They Chalk It Up To My Anger And Not To Their Own Fear. Imagine You're A Girl Just Trying To Finally Come Clean, Knowing Full Well They Prefer You Dirty And Smiling.

I Make Such A Good Statistic, Somebody Should Study Me Now; Somebody's Gotta Be Interested In How I Feel, Just Cause I'm Here, And I'm Real.

My Main Tactic Is To Focus On The People I Respect. The People I Think Are Great People. Do I Have Their Respect? Do I Have Their Support? If The Answer Is "yes," Then I'm Doing Ok.

Goldfish Have No Memory, I Guess Their Lives Are Much Like Mine. And The Little Plastic Castle Is A Surprise Everytime.

One Thing I Do Find In The "lost" Generation Or Something Is A Kind Of Abhorrence Of History, You Know, Like It's Boring, Dumb, Or Just Not Interesting. I Think It's Terribly Interesting If You Can Get Your Head Around How It Relates To Where You're Standing Right Here And Now.

My Writing Just Kind Of Exists Out There In The Air-it's All Sort Of Intended As Spoken, Or Sung, Word. So, To Commit Them To The Page...that Way Was Kind Of Intimidating To Me, Yet Intriguing, To Try To Reflect The Rhythms And Connotations And Emotions That You Can Deliver, Speaking-wise, On A Page.

Someday You're Going To Get Hungry And Eat Most Of The Words You Just Said.

God Help You If You Are A Phoenix And You Dare To Rise Up From The Ash A Thousand Eyes Will Smolder With Jealousy While You Are Just Flying Past

I Do Believe That Music Has An Intense Power To Connect Us Together, To Inspire Us To Become Ourselves.

When You Sit Right Down In The Middle Of Yourself You're Gonna Wanna Have A Comfortable Chair.

Playing Show After Show Is Like My Bread And Butter.

Bread And Butter

My Music Doesn't Really Sound Like Punk Music, It's Acoustic. And It Doesn't Really Sound Like Folk Music 'cause I'm Thrashing Too Hard And Emoting A Little Too Much For The Sort Of Introspective, Respectful, Sort-of Folk Genre Thing. I'm Really Into Punk And Folk As Music That Comes Out Of Communities And Is Very Genuine And Very Immediate And Not Commercial.

Don't Tell Me What They Did To You As Though You Had No Choice. Tell Me, Isn't That Your Picture? Isn't That Your Voice.

Some People Wear Their Heart Up On Their Sleeve. I Wear Mine Underneath My Right Pant Leg, Strapped To My Boot.

I Don't Hate Being Compared With Female Musicians. I Don't Mind That At All. I Have No Problem With Seeing Connections Between Women's Work.

I Do It For The Joy It Brings Because I'm A Joyful Girl Because The World Owes Me Nothing And We Owe Each Other The World

When I First Started Writing Songs And Being Very Explicit, It Was Hard, But One Of The Main Things People Respond To In My Writing Is That 'just Say It' Attitude Of My Songs. There Really Is Nothing Personal Or Private; It's All Universal, If You Can Just Find The Courage To Be Open About Your Life.

One Thing That Barack Obama Promised, One Thing That We All Know We Must Do Is Evolve Our Industry And Our Technology To Being Green And Sustainable. We Need To Move Away From Fossil Fuels And Nuclear Power, Both Of Which I Think Spell Doom For Human Society.

Music Has As Many Roles As People Make It.

Actually I Don't Know If Honesty Is A Strength Or Some Kind Of Weakness.

I Have Something To Prove, As Long As I Know There's Something That Needs Improvement, And You Know That Everytime I Move, I Make A Woman's Movement.

All The Wrong People Have The Power Of Suggestion And The Freedom Of The Press Is Meaningless If Nobody Asks A Question.

Freedom Of The Press

I'm Aware Enough, I Guess, Of American Labor History.

I'd Rather Suffer The Consequences Of Truth Than Of Silence.

Let's Grow Old And Die Together. Let's Do It Now.

When Everything Else Seems Unclear, At Least I'll Know I Do It For The Joy It Brings.

It's Great Being Your Own Boss, But Then, You Know, You Make Your Own Mistakes, You Know, And You Own Them. You Know, So It's Empowering, And It's Also Humbling Along The Way.

I Am A Work In Progress Dressed In The Fabric Of A World Unfolding.

I Think When A Society Has Such A Profoundly Dark And Awful Evil Such As Slavery In Its History, Then It Leaves Scars That Are Very, Very Deep. And Unless We Collectively Address Them And Really Put Our Effort To Healing Them, They'll Perpetuate. The United States Of America Are Still Suffering From The Echoes Of Slavery. I Think We're Still Reeling From All The Pain That Is A Result Of It, And That's A Reality.

You Rhapsodize About Beauty, And My Eyes Glaze. Everything That I Love Is Ugly. I Mean Really, You Would Be Amazed. Just Do Me A Favor, It's The Least That You Can Do, Just Don't Treat Me Like I Am Something That Happened To You.

When I Was A Teenager In The '80s, I Was The Only Girl In The Guitar Shop. Now If You Walk Into A Music Store, It's Mostly Teenage Girls. It's Great! It's An Expansion Of Possibilities For Young Women, Finding A Way To Tools Even If They Aren't Directly Handed Those Tools By Adults.

I Seriously Hate Pop Music And All Things Super-commercial, So I'd Be Hard Pressed To Feel Embarrassed By Anything I Listen To. Besides, I Have A Three-year-old, So I Don't Have Time For Guilty Pleasures Anyway!

Maybe You Don't Like Your Job, Maybe You Didn't Get Enough Sleep, Well Nobody Likes Their Job, Nobody Got Enough Sleep. Maybe You Just Had The Worst Day Of Your Life, But You Know, There's No Escape, There's No Excuse, So Just Suck Up And Be Nice.

And I Was Shocked, To See The Mistakes Of Each Generation, Will Just Fade Like A Radio Station, If You Drive Out Of Range...

There's A Paradox In Every Paradigm.

The World Owes Us Nothing; We Owe Each Other The World.

I Was Supposed To Be Cool About This, Yeah, I Remember - Cool Was The Plan. Tried To Keep It All Under Wraps, But The Wraps Kept Going Slack. I Keep Turning Round, I Keep Coming Back.

I Just Hope It Was Okay, I Know It Wasn't Perfect, I Hope In The End We Can Laugh And Say It Was All Worth It.

Now I Wonder Who Is Gonna Be President: Tweedle Dumb, Or Tweedle Dumber-- And Who Is Gonna Have The Big Block Buster Box Office This Summer.

When I Was Like Sixteen, I Was A Total Chick I Had Big Hair. I Was Seen As This Attractive Girl, And I Would Get All This Attention. And Then I Just Cut Off My Hair, And I Quit Playing That Game.

I Just Don't Know Any Other Word Than "feminist" That Describes A Person Who Believes Women Are People.

I Think If We Can't Use The Word Feminist, If It's Some Kind Of Taboo Or Dirty Word, Or Means You're Ugly, Or You're Angry, Or You're Not Dateable [laughs], Then You've Just Reduced The Language By A Whole Concept.

These Days, I Find I'm Applying A Little More Patience To My Process. If I Look Back On My Work, I Can See Those Songs I Bailed On Could Have Been Better, That Had Those Great Two Verses And Then I Kind Of Coasted From There. These Days, If A Song Is Giving Me Trouble, I Put It Aside And Pick It Up Later, And Keep Doing That, For A Year If I Have To, Until It Takes Shape.

I Would Like To Perfect The Art Of Being Studiously Aloof

[the 'corporate Takeover Of People's Lives'] Also Accounts For A Lot Of Homogenization Of Culture. There Are Fast Food Restaurants Everywhere. Every Place Tastes The Same.

When I Need To Wipe My Face, I Use The Back Of My Hand, And I Like To Take Up Space Just Because I Can, And I Use My Dress To Wipe Up My Drink. I Care Less And Less What People Think.

And This Vague Little Smile Is My All Purpose Expression The Meaning Of Which I Will Leave To Your Discretion.

People Need Something Or Someone To Fasten Themselves To In Order To Reassure Themselves That They Are Real.

I Can't Wait To Get Back To New York City Where At Least When I Walk Down The Streat, No One Ever Hesitates To Tell Me Exactly What They Think Of Me.

I Have Earned My Disillusionment.

Disillusionment

I'm Recording Our History Now On The Bedroom Wall, And When We Leave The Landlord Will Come And Paint Over It All.

There Is No Alternative. A Democrat Is A Republican Is A Big Businessman, And We're All Consumers Instead Of Citizens. It Just Manifests In The Culture, In The Music, In The Art. I Feel A Little Panicky About It.

A Good Brain Ain't Diddley, If You Don't Have The Facts.

First Decide What You Got To Do, Then Go Out And Do It. All We Can Do Is To See Each Other Through It.

But In The Garden Of Simple, Where All Of Us Are Nameless, You Were Never Anything But Beautiful To Me.

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