When a band first comes along, they should be confusing and doing something people don't accept. You don't want the first reaction to just be, "Oh, I get that."

I know that I can't ever write a song that just sounds completely saccharin. Even if I'm singing about someone being my complete love life, I'm singing about my own inabilities to be as bright as that person.

Starting out, I remember being on the same bill with other bands, and I always thought they were so much better because they were rehearsed and had all their moves down and they sounded really tight.

When you're making the record, you're not thinking about an audience, but you still need them and you want them.

If you can do something that doesn't rely on a major melody but still sounds immediate rather than being obtuse and devoid of anything to catch onto, that's great.

There's another thing that you don't want to take for granted, and that's the reality of there being an audience there each night. It's pretty amazing that that can happen around the world.

It's not like that because the improvisation makes it automatically democratic. No one's leading anything. I didn't have to worry about anyone feeling involved. It was just the most natural, easy process of making music.