I don't need drugs. Life is already tragic enough.

I've been writing and collecting songs on the ukulele for at least 10 years, so it was time to clear them out of the apartment building and make room for some new occupants.I need to make room for the bassoon record.

Our influences are who we are. It's rare that anything is an absolutely pure vision; even Daniel Johnston sounds like the Beatles. And that's the problem with the bands I'm always asked about, the ones derivative of the early Seattle sound. They don't dilute their influences enough.

You kill yourself and you make a big old sacrifice and try to get your revenge. That all you're gonna end up with is a paragraph in a newspaper. In the end, it does nothing. Nothing changes. The world goes on and you're gone. The best revenge is to live on and prove yourself.

The nice thing about money is that you can do good things with it. I still feel like if something needs to be done or we need to raise money for someone on death row, we can find ways to do it.

It's not a bad time to be me.

It's fun singing with other people who are really good singers. There's something kind of poignant about braiding a couple vocals.