My finger picking is sort of a cross between Pete Seeger, Earl Scruggs, and total incompetence.
Let me explain something about guitar playing. Everyone`s got their own character, and that`s the thing that`s amazed me about guitar playing since the day I first picked it up. Everyone`s approach to what can come out of six strings is different from another person, but it`s all valid.
I believe every guitar player inherently has something unique about their playing. They just have to identify what makes them different and develop it.
Live Aid (1985) (TV) was pretty shambolic. We came together and rehearsed with a drummer we`d never met before and then we were joined by Phil Collins, who we`d never played with before, on this great Live Aid (1985) (TV) stage. We went there with the spirit of it, but actually it was pretty shambolic.
I don`t think the critics could understand what we were doing.
I always believed in the music we did and that`s why it was uncompromising.
I think it was that we were really seasoned musicians. We had serious roots that spanned different cultures, obviously the blues.
I`m just looking for an angel with a broken wing.
But to put out a greatest hits on one CD was totally impossible, I just couldn`t do it. The best compromise was to put out two CDs - Early Days - which is what it is - and Latter Days.
I may not believe in myself, but I believe in what I`m doing.
My vocation is more in composition really than anything else - building up harmonies using the guitar, orchestrating the guitar like an army, a guitar army.
Almost the moment he died, they put him in Playboy as one of the greatest drummers, which he was - there`s no doubt about it. There`s never been anybody since. He`s one of the greatest drummers that ever lived.
I always felt if we were going in to do an album, there should already be a lot of structure already made up so we could get on with that and see what else happened.
Music shouLd be Like making Love. Sometimes you want it soft and tender, another time you want it hard and aggressive.