I still feel like if I can get a song to work with, say, a basic beat, a rhythm, some chord changes, and a melody, a vocal melody - if it works with that, then I feel it's written and there's something there. So I intentionally don't get involved with arranging stuff or fussing over the sounds and the edits and the beats too much, at least not in the beginning, because I feel like then you can fool yourself that you've got something there, when you might not.

Sometimes it's a form of love just to talk to somebody that you have nothing in common with and still be fascinated by their presence.

Artists are notoriously snooty and suspicious of anything coming from the business community.

Everything's intentional. It's just filling in the dots.

Probably the reason it's a little hard to break away from the album format completely is, if you're getting a band together in the studio, it makes financial sense to do more than one song at a time. And it makes more sense, if you're going to all the effort of performing and doing whatever else, if there's a kind of bundle.

I wanted to be a secret agent and an astronaut, preferably at the same time.

Always be skeptical about simplicity.