There is still some art in pop music. But it can't happen if you're not inspired.

I drink a lot, probably too much. My scene while writing lyrics is always a bottle of scotch and stacks of note cards, pencil and pencil sharpener. I throw around note cards and drink.

My job is to be some sort of music/lyric psychic, to figure out that that's the right song to not fight the lyric.

Notes don't make music until you learn to insert silence between them.

People learn at the rate they are going to learn.

You can't really control how people hear stuff. It's hard to remember that. I have to let go of it.

I'm definitely an anomaly, but I'm making things. They're selling, say, martinis, and I'm kind of making vintage Riesling. People aren't going to sit there very often, not your average public, and your average music-business monster is not going to take the time to notice the overtones and the undertones inside the flavor. They'd rather just have the martini.