Before Guadalcanal the enemy advanced at his pleasure - after Guadalcanal he retreated at ours.

I feel like a lot of people look at pop music with a very formulaic perspective in numbers and patterns, but an outsider would think that the process is very natural. It is, but there are a lot of times where people treat it like a sport - there are tricks you can pull, different combinations that make something better. I don't really think I approach it that way, but I definitely have a love for the science that is pop song writing.

There's a booming, rotating, never sleeping city in the center of my brain and no body can come in and I can't escape. I have a strange sense of pride that my brain works that way, but I'm also terrified of what would happen if I ever tried to think in another way.

Anyone who has been with me from the beginning has worked from the trenches with me and they've worked really hard. People that I have brought in where I am now, they haven't worked the way that we have, they haven't lost the sleep, and you know, the blood, sweat, and tears.

If I want to hang out with people, they unfortunately need to be working as often as I am.

I write songs very quickly, so the 20 minutes of joy I get out of writing a song doesn't compare to the two months of joy I get engaging with the people who like my music.

Before Guadalcanal the enemy advanced at his pleasure - after Guadalcanal he retreated at ours.