It's a marvelous feeling when someone says I want to do this song of yours because they've connected to it. That's what I'm after.

It seemed inevitable to try to address my feelings about everything that had happened. To a certain degree, it felt cathartic, but it's less cathartic to me than it is illuminating and helping me navigate my own feelings.

20-some years ago, I'd have a big old radio with a tape deck, and I'd hit record and try to get something down on the tape, but nowadays, I can use my handy little smart-phone; I sing into the app for voice memo.

When I started out, it was this sense of, "Let's put out a record and see what happens and see where you go and see how you feel and where we can take it." That was a very different world back then.

As far as politically how country music goes, it's true that it's regarded from a distance as a genre of music that at different times, the more right elements of the political spectrum have claimed for their own.

We all have two lives. The one we are given and the one we create.

I've crossed lines of word and wire and both have cut me deep. I've been frozen out and I've been on fire, and the tears are mine to weep.