Let's just cut a live record with three microphones in four days and talk about lizards and aliens. If I had taken that idea to even an independent label, I don't see a label out there that would've said, 'Oh yeah, that sounds great. We know how to market this.'

Sturgill Simpson

It's a long road, so we are just trying to stay focused and grounded and keep moving forward. I'll take it, though.

Sturgill Simpson

I worked for Union Pacific. I started out as a conductor at an intermodal switching facility outside of Salt Lake City. We'd pull in trains from all over the country, break them apart, consolidate the freight, and build other trains. It was great until I screwed up and took a management position. Then it became no fun very quickly.

Sturgill Simpson

I used to play a lot of electric guitar. I don't really consider myself a guitar player anymore. Then I got really into how the pickups work. And winding and de-winding Telecaster pickups. And then building Telecasters. And I became more fascinated with making them than I was with actually playing them. So it's a slippery slope.

Sturgill Simpson

I lived in Japan when I was younger for about two years. I spent my time equally between religiously studying Aikido in Shinjuku by day and hard partying in Shibuya and Roppongi by night.

Sturgill Simpson

I saw Dolly Parton play at the Glastonbury Festival to about 120,000 people. It was an ocean of human beings. I was a mile away from the stage, and I swear to God, I could feel her energy.

Sturgill Simpson

I had a great job with the railroad, a good salary.

Sturgill Simpson

I'm very grateful, but at the same time, I'm glad all this happened when I'm 36 instead of 26 because I - I'm just such a homebody, and I just want to write songs and make the best record that I can.

Sturgill Simpson

I don't pretend to be an astrophysicist or anything, even though I do read about certain things like metaphysics and cosmology that I've always just been really interested in. I don't pretend to be able to sit down and pontificate on any of these subjects.

Sturgill Simpson

You can embrace nostalgia and history and tradition at the same time - it has to progress or it can't survive.

Sturgill Simpson

My paternal grandfather, when he was in the army in World War II - he was over in the South Pacific, and he thought he was gonna die. And he wrote a letter to my grandmother and their newborn son, thinking he wasn't gonna come home.

Sturgill Simpson

I want all that dirt and grime and life-sauce. A lot of my favorite old soul records have it, but you don't hear it on country records anymore.

Sturgill Simpson

I could go back to the railroad. I liked that job.

Sturgill Simpson

It's hard enough to sit at a table and talk to most people as it is. But we can go to some town, and there's 300 people we've never met before, and by the third song, we're connecting with everyone in that room.

Sturgill Simpson

Kentucky isn't particularly religious.

Sturgill Simpson

I needed a writing space to get out of my house with the little guy. Because any time I try to write or sit down and do things, he wants to be there with me and play the guitar.

Sturgill Simpson

I think when you're dealing with any issues about trying to become a better human being, you have to look at a lot of things about yourself that maybe you don't want to or aren't able to.

Sturgill Simpson

Even with most finite planning, you never know what the final result will reveal itself to be until it's staring back at you.

Sturgill Simpson

Music Row gets dragged through the dirt, but they're just trying to survive.

Sturgill Simpson

Elvis was a way bigger influence than Waylon Jennings, but you don't wanna tell people, 'I never really listened to Waylon.'

Sturgill Simpson

There's a lot going on in country music, with indie-label hipsters and underground bloggers arguing their interpretations of what country is, and pop-country stars defending themselves. That deserves to be poked fun at.

Sturgill Simpson