There's the false security of feeling a great force of love from your audience one day and then the next morning you wake up and you're exhausted, and that love is something you have to reach for the next day.

With touring, it's like you're in this car and you've got this much fuel. You know that if you drive carefully and take your time and search your way so that you don't take the wrong turn, you'll have exactly enough fuel to go where you're going. You are empowered as you go by your audience.

We always have a basic structure for a piece of music, but we encourage the musicians to elaborate on whatever they feel at that particular moment. There's a definite conversation happening on stage. I think it is very important for us as creative musicians, to instantaneously describe any energy that is visible at that time.

There's fatigue but also a deliberate desire to want to reach absolute perfection at every concert.

There's something extremely fragile about musicians, and that's their strength.

Years ago I sang on a track using that voice and someone asked, 'Who is that terribly depressed man?' But Patrick loved it. He said, 'You sound like a young boy, like a child, like an old woman, like an old man,' and really, we all have all of those things inside of us. I don't do any vocal gymnastics to make the voice better as I age. If it comes out rougher, then it's true to what's happening. Singing is who I am. I didn't train for it, any more than I trained for anything else I did. I probably should take better care of myself physically, but it goes against the grain.

The second and sometimes most important part of the creative process is performing it live, so that the work can evolve to a different level and it is also important to make that connection with your audience as they are the reason why you make this work in the first place.