It's meant to reaffirm the validity of that music - clean, minimalist, honest, classic music.

Quality is timeless: It will clearly define itself. And so I make reference to and acknowledge things that I feel have been dismissed, trying to restate those musical and cultural elements clearly and vehemently

I quit eating red meat a long time ago. I'm a vegetarian, but not by a moral issue or any kind of stand. I still eat dairy. And I quit eating sugar about the same time I quit eating red meat, but I eat fruit.

However you arrive at the ability to ignore self-doubt - if you can acquire it or possess it or find it or discover it - move beyond self-doubt.

I don't really drink, but I've been around a lot of drinking and, at 18, when you start playing in bars, you start to witness the good, the bad and the ugly of alcohol as a source of escape. I wrote about it because I witnessed its use as a means of medicating - a lot of people using it to medicate themselves from hurt.

In retrospect I wrote things about my life and my family's existence, I realized that it was a frighteningly harsh way to make a living. And I used to say that they were slowly dying trying to make a living.

I'll never quit playing country music, or at least acknowledging it, always, as the cornerstone of what I am.