Indie rock is just as susceptible - if not more susceptible - to all the gross things about people becoming total ass clowns in music, and only worrying about money and image. I'm not interested in being a part of that.

People gather details and comparisons but it doesn't really bother me or land on me of any sort. I don't know if I was... Maybe I was influenced by them, maybe I wasn't, but I don't know. I was probably influenced by everything I've heard. So it doesn't bother me at all, but it doesn't sway me either.

I grew up with a good set of values, but it was never too strict. I was always encouraged to be a free-thinking individual.

The reality is, if you're friends with somebody you should be able to be honest with them, and that honesty should be the biggest magnet to truth.

I'm a pretty shy guy when it comes to girls and sex.

It was all the things I wanted my music to be, but yet it wasn't grand and it wasn't obtuse - it wasn't overshooting, it wasn't undershooting, it was precise. The lyrics and the way that I was able to extract and excavate emotion within me.

Hopefully, most days, you're like, "This is sweet. I wake up and do the things that I do and I'm usually smiling." That's how my dad is with his job.