I force myself to care about the music end by wrestling with it for years.

I'm probably more into a more spacious, even meditative, quiet delivery of singing.

Of course, no lyrics are ever unintentional, but I think bands like Wolf Parade and the Arcade Fire have a tendency to touch on big themes without really following through on them or tying them in to a particular logic.

Generally, if you could picture a bunch of rock and roll momentum behind a song and it was particularly melodious, maybe the Pornographers would do it. If it was kind of moody and more lyrical, then maybe it would be a Destroyer song. Anything that's really lyrically driven I would keep for Destroyer.

I like playing music. I don't always like the feeling of people looking at me. I don't think I'm a natural performer, but I'm getting better.

I think the more removed I feel, the more I warm up to the role of singer.

It never really interested me in the past but, for the first time, I wanted to make a pop record. I thought a good way of doing it would be to make songs that didn't really make sense to me as songs; songs that I couldn't just sit down and play in front of someone and then get them to play over it.