Today, MTV doesn't play videos anymore, but YouTube certainly has become the next MTV.

It's always surprised me that mainstream America had the good taste to like R.E.M. It doesn't have the digestible quality the general public tends to look for in its favorite musicians.

The first horror movie I saw, in first or second grade, was My Bloody Valentine [1981], where there's a deranged killer in a miner mask stalking a small coal town.

There's a structure to a detective story that I can easily understand. I understand playing that particular game. It's like solving a puzzle. Or creating a puzzle.

I was never afraid on stage. That's where I was the least afraid. I could just do what I do and I had the amplification and the lights.

When you create a fence, you keep people out, but you also limit your mobility.

I have always wanted to be either a cinematographer or a veterinarian.

I've never had a mentor. I've always wanted one. I'm actually really disappointed that nobody took my under their wing.

Looking back, [R.E.M.]videos, by in large, have always been art films. I'm thinking of "Losing My Religion." That's a landmark piece.

There is a value to moving more slowly through a story.

There's also something sexual about watching the nubile girl in terror. But you do take on her fear as your own.

Unless there is a Good Friday in your life, there can be no Easter Sunday.

My thoughts are really all I think about.

Am I my brother's keeper?

We do not have a fear of the unknown. What we fear is giving up the known.

I have a very low boredom threshold.

If you eat dead food, you are going to feel dead. If you eat live food, you are going to feel alive.

We tend to think of the problems of globalization and cultural identity as peculiar to our times. In fact they are rooted in ancient problems of civic belonging.

Two things have always been true about human beings. One, the world is always getting better. Two, the people living at that time think it's getting worse.

Being Nigerian is a strong part of my identity. Being American is a strong part of my identity. And there are important parts of who I am that really have nothing to do with my national connection.

This earth is a garden, this life a banquet, and it's time we realized that it was given to all life, animal and man, to enjoy.