That's something I've certainly taken from writers like Gord Downie is that there is a whole potential for breaking out of meter. Even if you don't do it, you're permitted to. He gave a lot of writers permission to do that, to expand and push out the borders of what a rock song can contain.

In this frightening, anxious time to be alive it can be liberating to remember that nothing lasts forever. That can focus and invigorate our hopes.

I think of Gord Downie voice as Whitman-esque. He has a poetic voice that contains multitudes, both the suppleness of the instrument of his voice, and just the lyrical boundaries that he pushes, which are really always thrilling to me.

I do get a little shy about contemporary language and events, but I also enjoy the idea of dating myself, somehow, anchoring a song in a specific time and place. Sometimes the new words and objects are too enjoyable and descriptive to ignore. And maybe making work that acknowledges that it won't last forever is important, too.

In my mind I still qualify as punk, though I know four out of five punks would disagree.

I still think of myself as punk, because the way I became empowered to play music is entirely due to punk bands.

One of the wonderful things about music these days is that it's less cliqueish.