Anytime something starts to feel like a popularity contest or not about the music, I'd rather just not be involved. I'm not a big high-fiver. That really gets to people around me when we have a No. 1 or something big happen. I'm not a big, 'Let's go have a party about it!

I try never to focus on the radio, just find great songs, find emotion and just write the best songs you can. I think when you get fixated on trying to do something too accurate, it becomes more washed out and less what you intended it to be. So I think each time the challenge for me is to try and reinvent a little bit.

When you take other people's opinions, you end up flailing and you have no center.

I'm really private, and also, when I'm home, I'm home. I don't like people in on my business. I believe that you can be overexposed.

I don't want to hear songs about how sunshiny things are. I don't like songs that feel like radio candy I like the ones that make you think, laugh or cry - they pull some kind of emotion out of you.

Let's be naughty and save Santa the trip.

Country was about character. Country's changed because of monsters like Clear Channel who bought up all the stations and sliced them up into formats. Our demographic is now the soccer mom.