Woody said :

"I hate a song that makes you think you're not any good! I hate a song that makes you think that you are just born to lose. Bound to lose. No good to nobody. No good for nothing. Because you are either too old or too young or too fat or too thin or too this or too that. Songs that run you down or songs that poke fun at you on account of your bad luck or your hard travelling.

"I am out to fight those kind of songs to my very last breath of air and my last drop of blood.

"I am out to sing songs that will prove to you that this is your world, and that if it has hit you pretty hard and knocked you for a dozen loops, no matter how hard it's run you down and rolled over you, no matter what color, what size you are, how you are built, I am out to sing the songs that make you take pride in yourself and in your work. And the songs I sing are made up for the most part by all sorts of folks just about like you."

-- Woody Guthrie

"Any damn fool can get complicated; it takes a genius to achieve simplicity."

-- Pete Seeger on Woody Guthrie