I grew up in Tennessee, and if you didn't play football, you were a sissy. I got slurs all the time because I was in music and art...I was an outcast in a lot of ways...but everything that you get picked on for or you feel makes you weird is essentially what's going to make you sexy as an adult.

I believe in things I can count on, like beer and ESPN and my grandmother's pecan pie.

I think, for me specifically when it comes to music, I don't think that I need any persuading to think about it. It's always kind of in the back of your mind and - but I think it's part of who I am and always will be, I mean, in a very cellular way. When you grow up doing, you know, one thing, I think you get to this place where you want to try new things. And I do think that we live in the type of world where people get comfortable with you in one way, and so seeing you in a different way, it takes some time.

My step-dad is probably the greatest man I've ever known. The best advice I've ever been given was when he told me to enjoy my life because one day I'm not going to be as agile as I am now.

You have a lot of time on these tours. As Alice Cooper said, you can either drink all day or golf.

I think it's the first idea I ever got about doing something on my own, because it was the first time I have ever really felt the confidence to do it.

Just writing and being in the studio was like therapy for me.