I've got four or five records in my head at a time that I try to work on and I would like to do a guitar trio record next - since The Police I've mostly made records with keyboards.

It's exciting to see if you can create something that sounds, at least to your own ears, exciting.

For me, a great show is when there's a great rapport with the band and the audience, and we're all really into it. The first trick is to bring the audience into the band, break the ice, have a life, and be one, so you can enjoy the next hour and a half together.

Sometimes, literally within a few minutes, you'd be off this amazing roaring scene and back at your hotel room, staring at the patten of the wallpaper. It's very surreal. You're back in your room, and it's dead quiet and really weird.

You're on the stage and you've got all those people yelling at you, so you better be right in the moment, reacting to that. It's completely live and organic. Even 20 years later, it's the same thing. You may be even better on your instrument. Hopefully, you are.

Of course the playing is important but writing and the establishing of what you are going for is prime too.

As an artist, I move along in my life, into whatever things I'm doing, and I hear things where it's like, "Oh, that'd be a great [song] title! I'll use that!" So I keep a running list of titles on my computer. I've got these words and phrases that just sustained my interest. So I'm a step ahead, really, with the titling!