When I moved to Seattle, I was hanging out with kids who had done drugs, had sex a million times. I look at them now and realize their childhood was taken away.

Where I grew up, I could be a punk rocker and a jock. But in college, it became apparent that those two worlds didn't mix. When I brought my guitar back to school after Thanksgiving break, a friend handed me his bass and said, 'Listen to the Ramones.'

I have to go someplace where I can soak myself in a creative atmosphere.

When I moved to Seattle, I was hanging out with kids who had done drugs, had sex a million times. I look at them now and realize their childhood was taken away.

I'm healthy enough to still skate, so I gotta go because growing up I didn't have - I mean, I grew up in Montana so... there was kind of a little half-pipe in my yard, and that was the extent of the skate terrain in Montana. So I've got to go out and make up for lost time.

Right after 'Backspacer,' my best friend got killed tragically. Something happened to me then where I got super motivated. I had a shelf of all this unfinished music... So I just went to work and made a conscious decision that I was going to finish a bunch of stuff. Life's short.

I've been interested in Eastern religions since I went to college because I was trying to figure out where I stood with Catholicism.