I think the other thing that shaped me a little bit is that I really didn't have any success in music until my early to mid-30s.

My style of lyric-writing is very specific and has a lot of details, and I think people react most to that.

I think you want to write a song that's like the songs you are into.

You are hearing this song, and you're 16, and it's a song about love, or a girl. And then maybe there's a girl at school that you like. So you're going to be thinking about that girl. That song is sort of about that girl. The songwriter doesn't know that girl, obviously. He wrote it for something else. But there's the specific meaning with the universal again.

There's a lot of ways to be honest that don't necessarily involve absolute facts being true. I think that's something I absolutely try to do.

Springsteen on that record started writing less about having your wind in your hair and turning the radio up and more about being dragged down by adult things. Regular people trying to get ahead. A little less mythical and romantic, and more real. It's a really spectacular record for that reason.

You can either go to the gym because you want to lose weight, or you can go to the gym because you like how it makes you feel when you're running.