Oh yeah - for sure - hardly a week doesn't go by when I don't hear something wonderful that someone has made in some low-budget situation, primarily with a view to selling a few hundred copies at their concerts.

I work in the margins. The margins are where you'll find the nice people. You'll find real friends. You'll find honesty. You'll find integrity. You'll find relationships that will last you for a lifetime and will be there to support you in the bad times, which are the only relationships that matter anyway. Relationships that are all about power and money aren't worth having.

Now I'm having to live with sales of around 50,000 per album - but I'm pretty content with my place in the general scheme of things, even if it's meant I don't drive a fancy car and can't afford grand vacations.

Oh yeah - for sure - hardly a week doesn't go by when I don't hear something wonderful that someone has made in some low-budget situation, primarily with a view to selling a few hundred copies at their concerts.

Now that I'm staring down the barrel of the last act of my life, I'm less excited about control and solo effort, and I resent the way the business aspects interfere with my space for creative writing.

In some ways it's taken me decades to come clean and make honest work - and still to this day, sometimes I find myself wanting to hide behind my work and deny the more biographical aspects.

Gandhi was only minding his own business when he took a walk to get some salt and ended up overthrowing the British Empire. You can't set out to overthrow an empire, but if you have to get some salt then get some salt. If you have to write some independent songs that are honest, just write them. If you have to do a day job stacking shelves, so be it.