When you listen to the music, you can also see the film or read the article, and it's all part of the same journey that you get to take with the artist you're interested in. It's a balancing act.

Optimism is a revolutionary act

The future isn't just something that happens. It's a brutal force, with a great sense of humor, that'll steamroll you if you're not watching.

Take it from your own life, write what you believe in.

Probably having fallen in love with music and movies at a young age and then first learning about writing by kind of following the path of writers like Dave Marsh and Lester Bangs and being a rock journalist.

I wanted to follow the path of music and feel that power, and I couldn't turn back.

There's several ways to be a journalist. One way is to be combative and take the person to task and what you have is a portrait of somebody defending themselves, which is interesting. The other thing is to slip into their world and really be a representative for all the people that love the experience of that artist, and have them get so comfortable that you become invisible and they're themselves.