I had a band called the Sound Of Love and that was R&B songs about girls in my high school. I played in some other indie bands who were trying to make it big; those sucked. Then I started Makeout Videotape and that was that.

Journalists say my music is "blue wave," or "dreamy," or "jangly-slacker jewel," and none of it really makes sense to me.

[Juan Wauters] got the tips for Queens because he grew up there.So him and my roommate, Matt Volz, they hooked me up, New York Style.

I really love a lot of Japanese music, like Ryuichi Sakamoto and this guy I got really into, Tatsuro Yamashita. When I was a little younger, I thought synthesizers meant Kraftwerk, cold, robotic, weird, Autobahn. But these guys are having a lot of fun on these things. Sometimes. Sometimes it's very somber. They could go either way.

I like guitar. It just turned out that it's the instrument I learned to play. I have a lot of respect for it and I'm learning more and more everyday.

Usually when festivals are really huge it's kind of weird. It's totally fun for me and my band to play in front of a crowd that doesn't necessarily know who we are, but festivals get pretty impersonal when they get super large.

I'm getting paid to tour and travel and I don't have to work a shitty job. And it's weird because you like start getting pissed off about that.