Mortal City was really influenced by geography. [The song] "The Ocean" is the Pacific Northwest. Southern California and New York also figure into songs, and Iowa. "February" is very much about New England. "Mortal City" is Philadelphia. The whole album is this anthropomorphized landscape where the metaphors live in this geography.

There's a marketing scheme that tells you that pregnancy and child rearing will make you into a moron, that your kids are only happy when you're buying them stuff. It's hard being a parent, but I laugh a lot and smile a lot and really enjoy it. The ratio of laughter to sadness is higher. There's part of me that wants to broadcast that. Parenting only affirmed what I already cared about, and that's good.

I have a sordid past.

I was raised by parents who really admired the religious leaders of the left, as many 60s and 70s liberals did.

Everyone has to decide how they're going to appear in their lives, how they're going to put themselves out there to the world.

A lot of men were also becoming more attuned and less afraid of women [in the nineties ].

I am happy to do political fundraisers. I always hope that my friends will be, too. It's part of who you are and you shouldn't feel ashamed of what you believe in.