So, I'm on Sesame Street, walking around with all these monsters, Elmo and his buddies, a whole bunch of chickens, a whole bunch of penguins and a number four dancing about. It was just pure joy, simple, ridiculous fun, stupid joy. There's no irony. Sesame Street is just a crazy great place to be.

I don't think that village idea of actually knowing what you're contributing to the whole exists anymore.

I was grateful to be away from all that familiarity, to have a chance to do something anonymously.

I had to let myself imagine a calendar with no lines; when every single day is being predetermined six months in advance, there's no more fluidity to time.

I never really lived outside of the city growing up, but I'm always looking in between the lines of the city, and I magnetize over to the green spots.

There's real potency in metal. Metal fans love metal as if it's a nation they would fight for. It's not diluted by pop culture.

Gatekeeper was sort of my first attempt to put a little bit of a frame and boundaries around songwriting, and try to figure out a way to approach it that had a sort of end result in mind. I havent written many like that.