Kids can make fun of you for having the wrong shoelaces: that's just kids. But I don't think I had any trouble making friends.

I didn't start making music in order to be famous.

Then, you know, the other more-traditional role of the producer in, like, the kind of Quincy Jones sense is kind of part arranger. So you're coming up with, like, these - you hear these songs that are quite bare-bones, and you dream up what's the band doing? What's the rhythm section doing? What's the guitars, strings, pianos - that sort of thing. It's almost like a little toolbox.

My mother was pretty strict. I hated it, but maybe it made me a bit more sensible.

Making music is a lifestyle; go to the studio and sit in front of your computer, drum machine or guitar for 10 hours a day. The good stuff will come.

D'Angelo could sing the phonebook and it would sound good.

And then, also, when you're doing something that doesn't sound like anything else on the radio at the time, you almost need to, like, ironclad it to make sure it gets through, you know?