Once again, when they weren't playing or singing, musicians were busy talking in 2003.
Here's just some of what they told us:
John Mayer: "That (numerical success) is what other people can gauge your success by. I care so little about that right now. I would rather make a great record that tanks (commercially) than one that is OK and goes to the moon. There is numerical success and actual artistic success. I hope people really like the record and it means something to them. To have a numerical No. 1 doesn't mean that record is good. What means the most to me is when people say that record meant something to them."
Ruben Studdard, American Idol winner: "I'm glad I can inspire anybody to be the best they can be. I always thought I had very good self-esteem about myself. I never changed through my life. I want other people to be like that. It's a good feeling to inspire others, especially kids, to try to be the best they can be, and take advantage of opportunities they can have. I think the sky's the limit for kids these days."
Sarah McLachlan: "Music is the closest I get to feeling religious. Playing music brings it out in me. It takes me inward and really helps me clear my head and think about what is going on in my life. I hate to use 'soul searching,' but it is."
Cyndi Lauper: "Because of computers and all the new media and technology, music seems to have less of an impact in our lives as it used to, and that is a shame...There is always good music being made. Whether it is popular or on the radio is another matter."
Coldplay drummer Will Champion: "If you lose your integrity and your passion for music, you don't deserve to be in a band. A million other people can do it better than you if you don't really believe in it."
Rosanne Cash, on what she learned from her late father, Johnny Cash: "Personal integrity, to kind of be truthful to yourself....He advised me to take care of family first. He learned that the hard way in his early professional life, the constant touring and exhaustion and so many days away from home. It caused him a lot of pain early on. I've always kept his advice in mind if it's a choice of 'Will this hurt my kids, even if it helps my career?' "
Barenaked Ladies' Steven Page: "We experiment but we are willing to pay attention to each other. The biggest thing is mutual respect. When outsiders come in and work with us, people always comment that they have never seen a band get along as well as we do. We fight like brothers and friends, but we respect each other."
Brad Arnold, frontman of 3 Doors Down: "I don't get into the rap-rock thing that seems to be a lot of what's out there. We really do hope we have helped bring back some good old rock'n'roll. I think the Nickelback boys are furthering that along, and making some rock to go along with it. More bands are out there. It's not so much about the barking dog syndrome. I love songs that rock, but I want to hear some melody."
Graham Nash, on the violence Crosby, Stills and Nash tries to address: "We (in society) have a violence gene that I don't see diminishing at all. As Stephen Hawking said, 'Our very future is in jeopardy.' We need to teach our kids a better way of dealing with their fellow human beings and stop the violence within ourselves first."
Yanni: "I'm an optimist. I look at life with a very positive attitude. I'm also a realist. I can see what is going on in the world. I'm aware but I'm an optimist. That is in the music. If I can alter even a single human being for the better, I've done my job."
Michael Kang, mandolinist, violinist, violist and a vocalist in String Cheese Incident: "Anything I can do as an artist and musician to instill hope in other people is kind of what I'm looking for. There is just kind of an energetic outpouring of positivity in the world that can be found in as many places as you want to look."
Tim Mahoney, 311 guitarist: "Music affects people in a positive way. We hope when they listen to our music, it makes them happy and hopefully it is an emotional kind of response in a positive way. We really feel soundwaves are a form of energy and you can affect people in a positive way with music."
Mighty Mighty Bosstones' Dicky Barrett: "It's everything you've heard. We are a great live band. We care. It isn't a bull's-eye every night, but we are always trying to hit it. If we miss the mark it's not because the effort wasn't there. We shoot for it and try to entertain whoever is in the room at the time. We've got quite a few bull's-eyes."
Grammy winning saxophonist David Sanborn: "It's a different world now then it was when I was starting out, a very different world. One thing I'd tell young players is to be patient and stay true to your original idea of what it is that inspires you to be a musician. Stay in it for the right reasons, but be patient and tenacious. It's about going the distance. That's what it is about in the end, and doing your home work, and putting in the time."
Bill Medley, prior to the death of partner Bobby Hatfield, on the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductees, The Righteous Brothers: "It's the love of music and traveling and performing that has kept Bobby and I out and about. We really love to perform. We're not just singers. Once that door closes and the lights go down and the band goes on and we enter the stage we are all 25. That's what the audience looks like to me.
"I think our music was very serious, at least the hits. They were pretty dramatic. It was some of the first adult music these kids heard. They were pretty adult and the songs were just great songs, beautiful songs, produced well and we sang them well. They weren't real commercial. They weren't fad songs. Bobby and I weren't real faddy looking guys, the handsome looking guys. We were just a couple of normal looking guys singing great songs."
Carlos Santana: "I'm not wired to play for people's minds or for critics. I'm not wired to win a popularity contest or receive awards. I'm wired to follow my heart in the same way as Coltrane or John Handy, to play outside the frame, blow the ceiling away. Some people are content with living with really small ceilings. I can't do that. I'd rather wash dishes or shine shoes if I can't play music in all of its colors."
O.A.R. singer-guitarist Marc Roberge,:"You have to have faith in people. A lot of times people in music lose faith in the consumer. The goal is to put faith in these kids. If you have faith in them they have faith in you and will buy your record. It's a matter of trust and faith and trust in the fans. A lot of people in music don't trust their fans. They want to hold them as far away as they can. No wonder they want to steal music."
Weird Al Yankovic: "I think I do everything just well enough. I don't think I'm a great singer, but I sing well enough to get my point across. I'm not a great musician, but I'm competent enough to do everything I need to do. The sum of my parts makes a fairly entertaining package."
Abe Cunningham of the Deftones: "Thank God we were given a chance to develop and learn and tour and figure out how to do what we do. We are in a world now where there is no artist development. The music business is getting worse, labels are cutting back. We were able to spend time and figure it out. A lot of times when bands are doing well they keep putting product out."
Max Collins of Eve 6: "Live is really the most thrilling thing about what we do for all of us. It's the connection you are making, feeling people out there are feeling the way you are, or the way you have felt. There's nothing like it."
Mars Volta vocalist Cedric Bixler Zavala: "What some people look for in some drugs, I hope they can find it in our music, go to our concerts and lose themselves. You have to give yourself completely to it."
Kris Roe, singer-songwriter and guitarist for The Ataris: "The worst thing you can do as a person is not look outside your little scene you are in and not realize there are just as many great jazz records as great punk records. Most good artists take their influences from outside the genres in which they play."
Classical clarinetist Richard Stoltzman: "The fact that different generations can make music together and learn from each other is a tremendous example of the calling of being a musician. It's so rewarding to be able to know that these little dots on the page can be interpreted by so many different generations of performers, and you can do it together, even with a piece that's 250 years old. The piece is not in a museum and it's real. It's right out there on the edge and it's for the audience.
"...I certainly believe you can't be a musician and not believe there is some awesome connection among us all, spiritually. You can call it God or something else. When we begin to get down to the common denominator in music, you realize that being a musician or going to a concert and being part of a musical experience is almost primal."
Susan Tedeschi on artistic motivation: "There is something there, some kind of inspiration that moves me to see what will happen next, what I can still learn. There is so much to learn. Learning is an inspiration. My husband and baby inspire me all the time."
Pearl Jam's Mike McCready on what the band brings to the table: "There's Eddie's conviction and his lyrics and his ideals, and he can just rock straight out. His vocals are incredible. And we all are really competent musicians. It's kind of exciting. We don't think about that. It's more of a feeling in the band. People get that sense when they come to see us. That's what music has always been to me: a feel. I've listened to the Stones many times and it still makes me have that feeling of joy every time. They are still around and put on a really exciting show. We also give it 120 percent."
The Doors Robby Krieger on former bandmate Jim Morrison: "I never met anybody who didn't like him. He was a genius, but he was an insane genius, but also the nicest guy you ever met in your life. That's why people loved him."
Bluesman Lonnie Brooks: "For every musician other people describe their music better than they can, because when you are playing from the heart you can't worry about who you sound like. It's just coming out, just like a fingerprint. That's your DNA man!"
Matthew Followill, lead guitarist of Kings of Leon: "There are a lot of older guys saying, 'Yeah! Rock'n'roll's back.' And younger kids are hopping on a new thing. We like it like that.
"Maybe (they sound fresh to people because) because we have so many different influences: Bob Dylan, Johnny Cash, all different parts of music. Maybe that's what the newness is, bringing all that together and trying the best we can."
Rachel Bolan, a founder of Skid Row, on his two loves, auto racing and rock'n'roll: "When you're in the staging area getting ready to go on the track, it's like the walk from the dressing room to the stage. I get an adrenaline rush from both, though it may be a different type. There's not a chance you're not coming back to the dressing room after a concert. In racing there's always a chance you'll end up in an ambulance. But you don't think about that that much."
Bruce Cockburn: "For me, remaining optimistic hasn't been that hard. The light to me always just wants to leak through there. I can ignore it for periods of time, but sooner or later I will notice, not that I want to ignore it. Sometimes the crap just gets to you, but the light is still there. You can't force yourself to be hopeful. I don't know how to do that. The source of light and hope is just around us. It's a question of allowing it to touch us."
Dan Fogelberg: "The songs are what I feel deeply. If that music can be translated across time and space to another listener, that's magic. I feel like a conduit or voice to this. When it can move others in a way perhaps I couldn't predict, I feel that's what art is."
"...And even though the industry has woefully lost its ability to create good songs, I think there are those of us who still hold to that high standard and improve ourselves as we go. This is still a very solitary and very meaningful thing to practice for singer-songwriters of the '60s and '70s."
"...I'm still the kid from Peoria who picked up a guitar. But it meant a lot to a lot of people. My music isn't just something to dance to, or for background music. It's something that actually touched a lot of lives."
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