It wasn't my natural inclination to get into writing protest songs.

I think nowadays it doesn't really matter where we are physically located. We create our own culture around us to a large extent, whether it's what we're listening to, what we're watching, what we're reading - it can have very little to do with one's immediate cultural environment. We are in a global culture in that respect.

It wasn't my natural inclination to get into writing protest songs.

I don't listen to a lot of music any more and even the people I've loved for years - the Nick Drakes of this world - I can't go back to them and listen to them over and over.

Creating a decent pop song is a challenge - and occasionally, once in every decade - it's kind of fun to do that.

I'm obsessed with books.

The public so often want to freeze the artist in a moment in time when they were at their peak, and they want the artist to revisit it over and over again as if it was something authentic.