I think trying to be offbeat is the most boring thing possible.

Maybe certain aspects of what I was doing were reacting against what was happening or what people said, too. That's something that happens when you're starting out. After some time goes by and you get a little perspective, you realize that you don't need to react. You can just carry on with what you're doing. That took me a long time figure out; I've only gotten to that point in the last five or 10 years.

It's hard to make music knowing that it's not going to be received by the listener in the way that it should be.

With my own music, I try to get away from things that are familiar and things that would be easy for me to go to.

It's so easy to criticize your own time, and I see that as a problem, even for myself, as a listener.

Most of my early records were not cohesive at all, just collections of demos recorded in different years. 'Odelay' was the first time I actually got to go in the studio and record a piece of music in a continuous linear fashion, although that was written over a year.

There's 40 or 50 songs that nobody's heard that I've done in between albums. There's a whole evolution from Midnite Vultures to Sea Change that's never been released.