On what made him want to play guitar, as told to Guitar World: "I was a huge Black Sabbath and Ozzy fan, and I loved the stuff Tony Iommi and Randy Rhoads were doing on guitar so I decided to start playing. I took lessons from a guy named Leroy Wright. I was, like, 15 at the time, and he was 25, and when I saw him playing it blew me away. When you hear somebody play, it's exciting, but when I actually saw him play, I thought it was the coolest thing on the planet. I was so intrigued by the whole thing that I just went, 'That's what I want to do with my life!' And to this day I've still got the same hard-on. All I've got to do is listen to great players and I go, 'Man, I can get better.' You can never get tired of that."

On being thankful for his career in music, as told to the AU Review: " � I thank the good Lord every day. I thank him when I wake up and when I go to bed. I thank him in the middle of the day. I'm definitely grateful for everything I have. Hands down. I don't need a tragedy to happen to realize how blessed I am. I don't need that. I don't need to beat up an 80-year-old grandmother and do six years in jail to realize that beating up elderly people and stealing their money is really not a good thing� I'm a soldier of Christ, man. Without a doubt� The bottom line is that He's with me all the time."