When I make music, it takes me two hours to get into the flow. To me it's like tapping into some kind of subconscious frequency: I just have to turn everything else off, open up part of myself, expose my fears and try to work through it in the music that I'm making.

I have a natural fear of anything that feels like celebrating my own past to an extent that doesn't allow me to continue to look forward. I don't know psychologically why it is, but I get a little uncomfortable with nostalgia.

I personally feel the need to experience life and new music and ideas before I can sit down and start writing music again.

If I wanted to contribute to the hyphy movement, what good is it making a hyphy record that isn't embraced by that community?

I realized that people don't quite understand what I do when I was the new kid on the block and a lot of Hollywood was offering me fairly cheesy projects.

I think a band - even a band that's been around as long as the Rolling Stones - I think that's still the formula. You know you're gonna get those songs, and you don't mind sitting through the ones that you maybe don't know very well because you know they're not gonna let you down - they're not gonna mess with you. And I kind of feel the same way about the way I structure my shows.

Everything right now tends to be the same and very aggressive, and I think people are getting a little burned out on it.