I definitely don't want to play by myself. I don't relate to playing music that way. I like interacting with people.

It's not so much a philosophy as much as it is a pace. We need to be personally involved with every aspect of the records including the artwork, we want everything to have a similar aesthetic.

Sometimes I have the idea right away, like, "Oh, this is what this song's about. This is how I'm feeling."

Around the time I dropped out of college, I decided to start taking what I liked about short stories and apply it to writing songs - to make these things that would change and keep going.

I definitely didn't have a lot of money. I had been fired from a record store. I was just trying to get by. I was on unemployment. I didn't have anything going full-time.

Things have changed. The suburbs are developed, but other parts, like where we recorded Spirit and Danse Manatee are still woodland and farmland.

People seem to think that folk music is people with acoustic guitars. Or punk music is people with mohawks, leather jackets.