With the Stray Cats at least, we really took the music somewhere else. First, we wrote our own songs. That's a real weak point in modern classics if you do rockabilly or blues.

As a genre, rockabilly's post-Elvis profile has seldom been lower in the United States. Many labels that produced fresh bass-slappin' sides during the '90's are now out of business.

I put a metronome up to all the songs, and I tried to really keep it true to the original tempos.

I basically sat down for a month, with all the Sun stuff I could find and just picked out my favorites. I didn't think that they were indicative of '54 to '57, although I tried to stay within that period.

With the Stray Cats at least, we really took the music somewhere else. First, we wrote our own songs. That's a real weak point in modern classics if you do rockabilly or blues.

To keep creating something with this type of music, you have to take it out of the box.

It is hard to play Blue Suede Shoes. I know everyone has heard it 10 million times, and that makes it even harder to play it, but there's a very laid back tempo on that. I was surprised at how slow it really was.