It was disturbing to me that an idea or a song could become something so different from what you originally intended. It's like if a friend took a stupid picture of you at a party on their phone, and the next thing you knew, it was on every billboard.

I didn't want to be on a major label. I wanted all the attention and the noise to go away because I wanted to be something a little bit more substantial.

Set your guitars and banjos on fire and before you write a song smoke a pack of whiskey and it'll all take care of itself.

There's a perception that if an artist produces another artist, they're going to imprint on them. But I'm the opposite. I want to hear that artist; I don't want to hear me - that's the last thing I want to hear. There are a lot of technical studio things I've learned or figured out, and I feel like I could use those things to help other people with what they're doing.

Technology was something I avoided when I started out - I didn't even have electric guitars. Only played acoustic.

In Japan, you get on the bullet train or the airplane, and I loved the little speeches the stewardesses would do. They even do little speeches before you play gigs.

You can't write if you can't relate.