I'm not really on a mission to tell anybody anything. I'd rather be figured out.

You know, we recently played a benefit with my husband, Elvis Costello, and Sir Elton John, who is a mutual friend of ours. Playing with Elvis and Elton and accompanying them with my band was a pretty euphoric experience.

My dream as a child was to play with a bass player like Ray Brown, who played with the Oscar Peterson Trio. The feeling I had listening to his work was almost carnal, so to actually play for him was earth-shattering for me.

The greatest thing about music is putting it out there for people to figure out.

Sometimes I can't get out of the character because the story is very intense.

I think that I was being much more uptight about those things before. I feel like I really don't have to prove anything at this point other than what I'm doing.

But the greatest thing about music is putting it out there for people to figure out. You want the listener to find the song on their own. If you give too much away, it takes away from the imagination.