The idea of self-effacement, the idea that you feel so powerless that the only tiny morsel of power you have is over your own ability to deny yourself food - that to me is a very profound and sad methodology and indicator of how powerless a lot of people feel in this world. That they will turn that onto themselves until they are physically smaller. I think it's affected my worldview a lot - just being sensitive and empathetic towards the ways people want to be small. I don't wish smallness for anyone.

There was this kind of wackiness that was really embraced and put on a pedestal. It was before the millennium. We were envisioning a future that was mostly idealistic. I think that came crashing down a little bit in 9/11, or a lot. There is something about Portland that does seem to still exist in this total idealistic world and total idealistic mind frame, and I think that's what Dream of the '90s is talking about.

After Sleater-Kinney broke up in 2006 I had very little desire to play music. It took well over three years before picking up a guitar meant anything to me other than an exercise.

You do have to live through things, and to live through things is to observe want, and to observe lacking. Even if the hunger is a curiosity.

To really be tortured by a song, it needs to be more than just something you don't like or don't get; it has to make your skin crawl by getting under it. Strangely, that last clause could describe provocative or daring music, as well.

There was a clarity to the Nineties. It was pre-9/11, before that anxiety kicked in that exists right now about the financial crisis or terrorism. We were all just going to move forward into the millennium and everything was always going to get better. Then, whoops, that didn't happen.

The idea of self-effacement, the idea that you feel so powerless that the only tiny morsel of power you have is over your own ability to deny yourself food - that to me is a very profound and sad methodology and indicator of how powerless a lot of people feel in this world. That they will turn that onto themselves until they are physically smaller. I think it's affected my worldview a lot - just being sensitive and empathetic towards the ways people want to be small. I don't wish smallness for anyone.