I remember you would record a guitar part, and we would have to sit there for 15 or 20 minutes waiting for the computer to process it. You'd see the little wheel spinning on the computer, and you'd be praying that the hard drive didn't crash and you didn't lose the performance.

Originally, the lyrics to "Girl" were really upbeat, and then it didn't work for me somehow. You need the dichotomy. If you're doing something happy and light, you need the shadows.

Back then, Pro Tools only had four or eight tracks, so we couldn't actually hear all the tracks. We could only hear eight at a time, so if a song had 25 or 30 tracks, we wouldn't be able to hear it until we went into the studio an put it all on tape. The process was a little bit backwards.

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.

Eventually, if you're experimenting with a sound that's unfamiliar, it gets absorbed, and somebody comes and does it better, and it becomes part of a vocabulary.

There are people who've prepared their whole lives for real heavy success and bask in it. They're so good at it and they obviously love it. I'm just happy to be making a record.

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.