I find it pretty fascinating how humans keep gravitating towards these giant centers. I went to this walled medieval village in France this year, and it was truly the most crazy, beautiful, bizarre place I've ever been.

When I stopped touring, it was like trying to stop a bullet train or a giant lead ball falling from a 100 stories up - it's momentum and it doesn't just stop. I drew a line in the calendar and made it a brick wall and just stopped dead. There was no other way. It would've taken another 100 years to slow down slowly. 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.

Music is pretty intimate stuff and I can only work with very few people: Gonzalez being one, Mocky being another and, on a completely different level, Broken Social Scene. With Broken Social Scene its not one-on-one, its a one-on-12. Its very healthy, very comfortable, like a big pot luck supper among old friends.

You hit a guitar, you hit a note, you hit a drum, you hit an organ. Meat and potatoes. Simplicity. Not getting too caught up in little tweezers of perfection.

With music, I wasn't curious anymore. There was no dialogue. By the time I stopped, I knew it wasn't going to be gone forever, but it just wasn't the right time for me to care about that.

Surreal can be exciting and good, and it can be like living inside an alien landscape, and it can be completely interesting, or you can be alienated from your own life - inside your own life, it doesnt feel familiar any more.

I would try to pick the guitar up sometimes, like, "Hey, remember me?" It was like reintroducing yourself to someone who's got a grudge.