I was sort of like a kid in a candy store, realizing it was fun making beats without the perceived burden that every track I did had to be a some progressive sample masterpiece. It was nice to blow off steam and work on those songs. For me, that’s what 'The Outsider' was about in general: forget everything, I’m just gonna follow my own music, and make the music I want to make.

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.

My core values are still the same about music, and my work ethic, and what I want to represent to people.

Things go wrong when the people who control that world stop listening to their own instincts and start catering to their fan base.

When I play that music live nowadays, there's a lot of things I feel I'd like to do - even things I don't think the audience is aware of, like layering subs underneath the kicks, and layering crisp hats underneath the muddy, trashy hats of the '90s. If I tried to play the music as it was next to my contemporary music, it just sounds like you're closing up half of the sonic spectrum.

I think one of the things about ageing is the jagged peaks become a little bit mellower...? Heheh. And I feel like I'm able to understand a little bit better where that sort of tack comes from.

It's about respecting what I think people like about the original music. I'm not gonna ever take it to the extent that I'm kinda George Lucas-ing moments of the album over and over again, trying to get them right over the next 30 years - I don't wanna do anything like that. But, yeah - it's a... fascinating conundrum through the years.