Marc Maron quotes:

When I was a bit older I had all of the George Carlin records, all of the Steve Martin records, all of the Cheech and Chong records and all of the Richard Pryor records.

I was also a big Woody Allen fan. When I got into college I listened to Lenny Bruce but it's taken me years to put him into context historically and really get what he did.

We need the children of Indonesia and the Philippines to manufacture our freedom of choice.

I think seeing Pryor's first movie, Live In Concert, when I was in high school changed my life. Pryor really put the heart in darkness for me.

The Internet has usurped the collective unconscious and access to cosmic consciousness has become difficult and almost primitive.

I remember seeing Richard Pryor's first movie; it was a midnight movie when I was in high school. I must have been about fifteen. It was one of the most cathartic experiences of my life. I'd never laughed that much.

When I was a young kid I loved Don Rickles, Buddy Hackett and Jackie Vernon.

As a performer you are being used to keep people watching so the commercial endorsements that support the network can be seen by as many people as possible.

On some level any appearance on Television can be seen as a product endorsement.

When you're a kid, you always feel you have this weird kindred-spirit thing with other Jews, until you get older and you realize it's just middle-class bourgeois Jews that sort of fit a template that your family fits into one way or another.

There's this whole post-modern, nuevo beatnik, retro-bohemian thing going on, you know what I mean? You walk into some coffee shops, and it feels like you're an ex-patriot in Paris in the 20s. You're like, 'Hey, isn't that a young Ernest Hemingway over there? Yeah, I think it is! Hey, let's go have a look and see what he's writing... It's a Gap application.'

I believe in God... just in case. It's like there's some list somewhere and you don't want to be on it. I don't want to say THERE'S NO GOD! and then die and say, Oh, Hi... Is there some kind of community service I can do?

I think that standup has always been an acquired taste and there was always only a handful of performers that were really inspired.

How complicated can ice cream flavors be? How much can you put in there? I mean, when the flavor's something like banana ice cream with caramel, fudge chunks, cheddar goldfish and pennies - you've got to draw a line there.

I'm sad to see the passing of the great drug warriors. I certainly did my part in that battle and I don't regret any of it.

Americans don't understand irony? I am an intelligent person living in the United States. My entire existence is ironic.

It's easy to maintain your integrity when no one is offering to buy it out.

You can't avoid pain in life. It's how you handle pain, that's what defines you.

I'm just very sort of compulsive and lack the ability to keep things in perspective. If I'm not writing or playing guitar or on the microphone or out on the road, I'm cleaning pots and pans or freaking out about some plumbing issue or tweeting.

I'm not completely sure we aren't all living in a hallucination now.

I didn't know that people compared Bill Hicks and I but certainly I'm flattered if they do. I knew Bill a bit. We had dinner a couple of times and played guitar together once. I really tried to keep my distance from him professionally.

As I became very conscious and more aware of things I got very into the beatniks and that kind of stuff. They were very important to me for a few years.

The medium of podcasting and the personal nature of it, the relationship you build with your listeners and the relationship they have with you - they could be just sitting there, chuckling and listening... there's nothing like that.

The next evolutionary step is into the screen.

When you commit your life to something and it doesn't work out, it is a tough place to be. Suicide can be the spiritual reprieve of a faithless person. I knew I could always just end it, and there was solace in that.

What appealed to me was the intimacy of the medium, the fact that I was doing it from my home, and the fact that I wanted to talk. I was not there to plug things. I don't do a hell of a lot of research. I go on a sort of kindred-spirit bonding that preexists the interview, and just see what unfolds.

I knew most of my radio listeners were lefty political people, and I decided definitively not to be that guy - not to address politics.

I'm not a narcissist, but I definitely have gotten enough explosive narcissistic shrapnel from my father. I'm sort of wired that way, but I don't feel that I'm pathological, so all I can pull from is my own existence and my knowledge.

Your insecurity and neediness is what makes you a big neurotic ball of comedy genius.

People who have babies tell me I will know a love that is beyond anything I can imagine, and a joy that is indescribable. Love and joy? That sounds horrifying. I have no way of knowing whether I can handle either of those. I'm much better with need and fear. They are what ground me.

Surveillance induced morality: relics of cultural retardation.

It seems people are more willing to let other people control their minds now and recreational drug use doesn't seem to have that same renegade sense of adventure that it once did.

Some of you may be perfectly happy with mediocrity. Some of you will get nothing but heartbreak. Some of you will be heralded as geniuses and become huge. Of course, all of you think that one describes you...hence the delusion necessary to push on.

Everyone is a little bitter. We're born bitter. The personality itself is really just a very complex defense mechanism. A reaction to the first time someone said, "No you can't.

The demand for standup in the eighties was created by how easy it was to exploit 'comedians' and create very cheap television programming.

I was an abusive, selfish, needy, angry asshole. Now I'm just kind of selfish, a little less angry, occasionally needy, with flights of asshole. I've grown.

If you can't afford the good food or if you can't afford health care or if you don't have a job or if your car is dangerous because you can't get it fixed and you DIE, you just lost the game-bzzzzz-thanks for playing extreme capitalism.

Jerusalem Syndrome is actually a rare psychological condition that occurs to some visitors to the Middle East. They get to Israel and just snap.

We live in an age where people are like, "I'd love to catch up. Maybe text me later? But don't call because I don't really listen to my messages. But if you text me..." We've displaced interaction into sound bites and untethered phrases and sentences that come up on the phone as Twitter feed.

Left wing, right wing, I am wingless and tired of trying to fly. Here comes the ground.

It amazes me that we are all on Twitter and Facebook. By "we" I mean adults. We're adults, right? But emotionally we're a culture of seven-year-olds. Have you ever had that moment when are you updating your status and you realize that every status update is just a variation on a single request: "Would someone please acknowledge me?

I'm happy, certainly, given the times we're living in, to be doing OK, and to not be worrying about money, and to be producing something I enjoy.

There are also always those burnt, hard kernels at the bottom that don't pop. You know why they don't pop? They don't pop because they have integrity.

The development of the comedy club industry destroyed the uniqueness and intimacy of the profession but it also created jobs for comics and bred some great performers.

It may have lost its special-ness forever and the clubs might not being doing well but I think standup is in the best shape it has been in a long time.

Comedy is obviously a matter of personal taste and the world always needs a clown and some people have no taste at all and any clown will do.

For my next trick I will make everyone understand me.

A lot of people think that Jesus is coming back. That's fine, it's your right. But you know, I live in New York, and I think he's running a little late. I'm asking myself, 'Alright, what happens if Jesus comes back tomorrow? What - does he make rounds to churches?' 'OK, everyone who's been good, buses leave in 10 minutes. I'll meet you in front of the post office. I gotta go. Oh, don't tell the Jews I'm back.'

Any comic can get on the radio show and be funny. You can get that on any morning radio show or afternoon radio show. There are plenty of people who do that. It's not a difficult format, to sit around with two or three comics and be funny.

Art is supposed to punch you in the brain, and it's supposed to stay punched.

Because we're comics and we pass each other on campus, we know of each other, and a lot of the time there's a mutual respect there.

Buying my wife a gun sort of like me saying, ' You know, I kinda want to kill myself, but I want it to be a surprise'.

Comics seemed to have a handle on things. They could sort of disarm and get control over reality. I found it very comforting to laugh.

Conversation is a beautiful thing. When I was a younger guy, just wandering around talking to people was what kept me connected to the world.

Dogs are too much to handle. I don't need anything in my house that's needier than me.

Faith in the face of disappointment is only enhanced by laughter in the face of pain.

For 15 years of my life I smoked, I drank, I used to do drugs... but during that time, I never once thought I was going to die. But the second I set foot on a stairmaster -the second- I am sure my heart is gonna explode and blood is gonna spray out of my nose.

God doesn't seem to talk to people like he used to. Who's he talking to now? I don't know. Then I'm walking down the street in Manhattan one day, and I realize maybe it's those guys you see walking down the street talking to themselves. You know, those guys that are like, 'I can't! No, I can't!' Maybe the other side of that conversation is God going, 'You're the new leader.' 'No I can't!' They're not crazy - they're reluctant prophets.

Have you ever had one of those moments when you look up and realize that you're one of those people you see on the train talking to themselves?

He does have that weird mixture of born again Christian and stupid that some people mistake for courage and focus.

Hopefully standup will become special again.

I always thought I was funny, but I was very sensitive, and very provocative just to get a rise out of people.

I didn't really want to kill myself, it just made me feel better to know I could if I wanted to.

I don't care what anybody says, I think that George Bush is absolutely the right president to oversea the end of the world.

I don't really compartmentalize well. I'm in a state of anxiety and panic a lot, but it's for different reasons. It used to be because I had nothing going on, but I work very hard and there doesn't seem to be an end to it.

I don't seek controversy. I don't seek to antagonize. Sometimes it happens, but I'm not there to argue politics.

I feel bad for people who have never been addicted to anything, because they're the real losers. You want to know why? Because they don't know what it's like to really want something - and then get it again and again and again.

I find that if I don't do interviews, I get a little squirrely. I think that when you engage with someone else, or when you engage in something you're passionate about, you're sort of out of your own head.

I found a great deal of relief and excitement watching comics when I was very young. My grandmother was very into them and so was my grandfather. They had a profound effect on me, so I just found myself watching comedians on the after-school shows: Merv Griffin and that kind of stuff.

I have a very primitive sense that if I just turn on a radio or the television, that somebody's playing that stuff for me.

I immediately went out and bought a book on anger management. And now I have that book, and I don't know if I'll get to the book. But I'm certainly excited about the day where I can't find the book, and I get to say, 'Where the hell is my anger management book?!'

I just wanted to be a good comic and had no sense of show business, but at some point you want the opportunity to write a show about your life.

I know that the podcast is typically something I can do forever, because it's mine; it's just me and my producer and business partner, so it's our business.

I live in Los Angeles, I know it exists. I know you're not supposed to taste air.

I look at every book as a self-help book.

I once talked about wanting to kill myself, but I don't think I was ever really planning on doing it. It was just comforting to know that I could.

I seem to offend everybody. I just never got into the universe. I don't seem to have a tremendous amount of discipline or patience with having to follow a story that is really multi-leveled and science-fiction.

I sort of get tired of myself sometimes. When you're busy, your life becomes relatively small. But I never get tired of talking to other people.

I think most other comics are like, "I'm going to do my fkin' act and that'll be that." With me, it's like, "What if I forget my jokes? What if I can't pull it together? This is going to be a fking disaster!"

I think sharing experience makes everything better. When people get talking about how they've overcome something or how they haven't, it's nourishing.

I think the reason Jesus is so popular, just on a celebrity level, is that he died at the peak of his career.

I think things evolve into jokes. I don't generally write them down as jokes. I talk them out.

I used to be jealous; I'm not jealous anymore. And a miracle happened to me, because if you're jealous, it's a cancer, it's a plague on your spirit, it really is. And I actually cured jealousy in a very weird way - I cured it with mathematics. And I'm not a math person at all, but I've been with my wife for about seven years, so we have had sex probably, I'd like to think, like, 9 million times or, at least, 1,500. So, the way I figured it, if she goes out and screws some other guy once - I'm still winning.

I used to do a lot of drugs. I didn't stop because I didn't enjoy them; I stopped because I couldn't handle the commitment.

I was married once before, and I stopped.

I'm glad to be part of the war on sadness. I'm a part time employee of the illusion that keeps people stupid.

I'm just looking for authentic engagement of some kind, and usually, after an hour or more, you get that. Some people talk at you. Some people just want to answer questions, but a lot of times, all of a sudden you drift away, and you don't remember you're on the mic, and you're in something real.

I'm just saying, 'Hey, throw me a bone. How about a smile, cute t-shirt? Look at me.' Nothing - unless it's a turn to their friends to go, 'Hey, why is that weird guy looking at us?'

I'm not a moron, but science fiction to me requires a suspension of disbelief and honest curiosity or fascination in that kind of bullshit. I've just never been able to make that jump, really. I like things to be more organic.

I'm not a racist. It's really case by case; it's not ethnicity specific. It's just the way I react to things that are different. I think that's normal. Everyone's nervous when they're confronted with things that they don't understand or are different. That's a normal human reaction. It doesn't become racist 'til you say things like, 'Oh, there's a lot of them.'

I'm not against people just being funny or telling stories. I don't need to delve into the soft, dark core all the time. If it happens, it happens.

I'm not fundamentally a writer. I know writers, and I have a tremendous amount of respect for them. It bothers me that no matter how well I do it, it's not really my format.

I'm proud to be part of a generation where reading is a 'look.'

I'm weird; I have a very strange emotional memory. I really somehow hold on to even passing moments with people.

In a lot of ways, I'm seeking some sort of peace of mind for myself. I'm a fairly emotionally petty, resentful guy who has an inflated sense of himself, and I needed to take that down a notch.

In most cases the only difference between depression and disappointment is your level of commitment.

In show business, it takes 10 years to create an overnight success. You've heard that, right? But what you don't hear is that that's the exact same amount of time it takes to create a bitter failure.

In the sixties and seventies you could probably name all the great comics. It was still special.

Is it hard to make a living in show business? Yeah.

Is there any indication we shouldn't be depressed? Are you living on the same planet that I am? Do you ever think that depression might be the reasonable human response to the crap we're going through as a species, meant to propel us into the next evolutionary step or, at least, into taking some different course of action, so that we might survive? Do you ever think that maybe it's the happy people that are really screwed up in the head?

It always astounds me that over the course of my career, and having lived in four comedy cities - New York, Boston, San Francisco, and Los Angeles - there's very few people I haven't run into.

It's great to have people come out. I do worry, though. They know me very intimately, in a way, if they listen to my show; they know a lot about me.

It's not all about love. That's half of it... The other half is about that moment you have with yourself when you're looking in the mirror, and you just go, 'Oh man. I'm going to compromise my dreams, get fat, sick, old and die someday. I kind of want to have someone around for that.'

I've become less angry and a little more humble by age and by experience and by going through the ups and downs of life.

I've had this look for about a year. I usually grow this beard out around Christmas. I like to go to malls dressed as Jesus, and I like to then walk around the mall and go, 'No! No! This wasn't what it was supposed to be about, people!' Then if there's a Santa at the mall, I walk up to him and say, 'Listen, fat man, you're just a clown at my birthday party.'

Jokes do finish themselves. I really do see them as ongoing conversations about personal themes that I ruminate on.

Let's be honest, this is a consumer based economy in America. That's all we manufacture here is need and appetite. We are the world's mouth. They make things in other countries, and they're like, 'Send it to America; they'll eat it.'

Maybe depression is the most reasonable response to all the crap around us. Maybe it's the happy people who need medication.

Most of my comedy writing happens through improvisation on stage; doing it in the moment.

Most of my comedy writing happens through improvisation on stage; doing it in the moment. Going up with an idea and fleshing it out over time on stage and in front of people until it becomes a full bit.

Most of the comics that I talk to I've never talked to for more than ten minutes ever. So 95 percent of the time you're really hearing the first conversation between me and that guy on the podcast.

My cats, the ones that I have, were feral when I found them so the relationship that I have with them 10 years in is very mutual, earned, and evolved over time. It was never an easy thing. I like that they have a certain distance and have their own sense of selves.

My dad is actually a manic depressive, which is very exciting half the time.

My favorite part is being engaged with somebody's story and life, and getting a laugh with people I have a tremendous amount of respect for or not, and being challenged by the immediacy of conversation.

Once I learned how to talk, personally, by myself to any number of people, which means do radio without talking to anyone in particular on the air - I just found that my brain became very free to engage in a sort of stream-of-consciousness style of doing what I do.

Show business is one of the few businesses that the devil will actually agree to own just a portion of your soul because he knows if you have a performer's ego you were probably working for him all along.

That's the big challenge of life"?to chisel disappointment into wisdom so people respect you and you don't annoy your friends with your whining.

That's an animal fable about humility. If you survive your mistake, you must learn from it. Accept that you're fragile, vulnerable, and sometimes stupid. Realize that you're not immortal and you've got to take care of yourself. And then laugh it off and fly away.

The bile makes it better. I am an information wasting machine - 100s of words a day.

The truth is, I can't read anything with any distance. Every book is a self-help book to me. Just having them makes me feel better.