I'll come in with a string of riffs and direct the musical ideas. But you still need a band and their input to make the ideas come alive. You can't underestimate band chemistry.

I'm Irish and I was born on St. Patrick's Day. I'm lucky sevens.

Actually, I was having dinner with Michael [Stipe, of R.E.M.] when our second album went platinum, which up until that point was the highest success we'd ever had. And he turned to me during dinner and said, 'Welcome to the deep waters, kid.' I'll never forget that.

If there was a simple ethic for the band, it was that we want to be able to do whatever we want to do.

Like any good tree that one would hope to grow, we must set our roots deep into the ground so that what is real will prosper in the Light of Love.

We had a wonderful time with this kind of grunge awareness, where suddenly rock was cool again. People wanted to head loud guitars. It was a great time, and I'm glad we were there. But the gimmick part has worn off.

Being overly identified with [a certain period of time] becomes a noose around your neck, and people don't want you to grow up, they don't want you to change, they don't want you to evolve.