When I started out making music I thought it was about thrills and adding layers, but I realized I want to focus on saying the most with the least.

Food in Dublin has gotten immeasurably better than it was. When I was a kid, there weren't a lot of options. Now you're overwhelmed with options.

I really wanted to get that dynamic on the record onto people and let them know it wasn't just a simple strumming along the guitar type of thing without ramming it down their throats so I kind of went the opposite way and sang some of the songs more quietly which allowed for the louder parts to sound as though there were more. It was the only way singing those songs made sense to me.

I feel the reasons my songs might seem dark is because of how I viewed the situations I was in and it was just something I always felt like documenting.

Life is short. I'm here to make music, I'm not here to sit on a beach. That sounds really boring to me.

The idea of trying to predict what people will or won't respond to is risky.

Hip-hop has been the guiding light of my life as a musician and a music fan. It's the one common thread through all of it from the time I bought my first record probably. It's always been there.