Quotes from John 5

'This Is My Rifle' is a kind of tribute to Al Di Meola.

Slayer just goes from generation to generation to generation, because it's just so great.

I think I'm always writing, and I'm always working, and I'm always trying to be creative. It's just something that I do all the time. I watch TV, and I'll play guitar.

I love doing it. It's great. I love doing the sessions, 'cause you're kind of like in a different band every day. I used to do them all the time. I think my first one was John Wetton from U.K. and Asia and all that stuff, King Crimson. It was so great. Really a lot of fun.

You gotta go after your dreams and do it. Go and do it.

Inspiration is a really hard thing to describe, but it's something that triggers your brain, like the first time I heard a certain guitar player that I loved or the first time that I saw a monster or the first time that I saw anything that really was an epiphany for me. It just stays with you your whole life.

A lot of bands, they take a lot of planning to do a live record. They have to hire a crew, and they have to have a recording truck and all this equipment, and they record every single show.

I liked what any other kid did back in the day. You know, Bob Seger, Alice Cooper, and everything else that was on the radio in Michigan. There was a lot of Steely Dan; just a lot of great music inspired me.

I would definitely say Zombie has been the best time I've ever had. It is just so great and so fun because, you know, we all get along so well, and, you know, it's just like, everybody, we're just all friends here, and we're just having a really, really, really great time.

If I wasn't in the band, I'm a Zombie fan, and I'm a White Zombie fan.

It's always good to go outside of your comfort zone.

I would hear Steely Dan on the radio all the time, and I listened to 'Aja' a lot. I mean, 'Black Cow' and 'Aja' and 'Deacon Blues' and 'Josie' and 'Peg'... all these songs are on one record. It's crazy!

I remember where I was when I heard Yngwie Malmsteen for the first time. It was such an epiphany for me, and it really shaped the way I play today. I think I heard him in '83, if I'm not mistaken - I was 13 years old - and it really was amazing for me.

I loved TV, and I watched anything with music - 'Hee Haw,' 'Happy Days,' anything like that. So I loved the Monkees.

There's not many crazy guitar instrumentalists out there that put on a crazy monster show.

When I saw Kiss, and it was monsters with guitars, I thought this was the greatest thing that ever happened.

What I do is, I look at rock guitar players, and I say to myself, 'What is this guy doing? What does he have that can inspire me?' I try to see what other people are doing and take what they have and turn it and twist it into my own thing.

It's funny, the power of music. I was watching 'Dracula,' the 1931 version with Bela Lugosi, and the only music you hear is at the very beginning of the credits. There's not one other piece of music; it's all silent. It's unbelievable, and it's very effective, too.

I'm always up early. I have so much to do, it's unbelievable how much I have to do in a day. So I have to get at 7 o'clock every morning, and I go to bed at midnight. You know, and I'm just going that whole time.

I think there are so, so, so, so many things you have to be... to do this... you know, to keep going in the music business. Of course, you have to play well with others, you know, and you have to be smart with business and be good at your craft and be healthy.

I was such a sponge with music.

People don't buy music anymore; they're stealing it. But you can't steal a live show. There's no way to reproduce a real live show. So I think that when you put a great bill together, that people will come out for it.

I am from Michigan; I am from Grosse Pointe. I was upper class growing up there.

When I came to California, I came from such an upper scale neighborhood, I was so sheltered, but I always knew I wanted to live in California, and I wanted to play guitar.