I got into one Metallica record. That was about it. I never got into AC/DC or Black Sabbath or any of that. I was interested in the side of heavy metal that had interesting guitar ideas, but that was a very short-lived thing.

There's at least one fist bump every interview.

From a very early age, I started to get really interested in how songs were put to tape. Not just listening to the songs, but the way the songs were recorded.

It might be a meaningless moment, but those sparks that ignite the song.... It's mystical maybe, those magic moments. And to make music for a living, to perform these songs over and over, you have to safeguard those sparks. If you can do that, they'll last a lot longer.

I don't like the way recording to digital sounds.

Every record turns into whatever the listener gets out of it.

As a producer, I like to bring in unexpected voices, unexpected musicians, like Watt and Joey Spampinato of NRBQ.