B. B. King

A lot of times I say to myself, “I wished I could be worthy of all the compliments that people give me sometimes.” I’m not inventing anything that’s going to stop cancer or muscular dystrophy or anything, but I like to feel that my time and talent is always there for the people that need it. When someone do say something negative, most times I think about it, but it don’t bother me that much.

Michael Bloomfield came in after rock n roll started, and he was a great guitarist. He idolized me – I know that. What else can I say ? he was a young, excitable man. To him, drugs were plentiful, and that was no good. I talked to him like he was a son of mine. He was a great and he was gonna be greater. But he was part of the “in-crowd” and so he never got there

I’ve known people that was a part of a family and always feel that the family liked everyone else but them. That hurts, and that’s as deep a hurt as you can possibly get. I’ve known people that would have problems with their love life. This is kind of how blues began – out of feeling misused, mistreated. Feeling like they had nobody to turn to. Blues don’t necessarily have to be sung by a person that came from Mississippi as I did, because there are people having problems all over the world.

I was born on a plantation, and things weren’t so good. We didn’t have any money. I never thought of the word ‘poor’ till I got to be a man, but when you live in a house that you can always peek out of and see what kind of day it is, you’re not doing so well. And your restroom is not inside the house.