When I was 13, I got my first guitar, and I could sort of play Ted Nugent songs, but I couldn't play the solos. But I could play along with entire Ramones songs.

So much energy comes out of concerts sometimes, especially good ones that are really moving. And that energy, no matter how great the show is, it dissipates within two weeks or a month.

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

The one thing about going from the audience to the stage in just three years is that you know how it feels to be down there.

Though some may think there should be a separation between art/music and politics, it should be reinforced that art can be a form of nonviolent protest.

Playing music for as long as I had been playing music and then getting a shot at making a record and at having an audience and stuff, it's just like an untamed force... a different kind of energy.

I've stepped back a few times and had these crazy epiphanies that we are blessed by having Barack Obama as a candidate at this time in our history. If we were ever to have a man of color become president - and it shouldn't be about that, and it doesn't need to be, because he's qualified on all levels - but if you do think about it, just in terms of that idea of unifying people, it's a huge positive.