I really wanted to get to the animal core of rock music and eliminate anything that wasn't necessary.

When I walk around New York now, there are so many ghosts. I find it very uncomfortable. There were many hard years, and I never really achieved any kind of comfortable financial success, so I just associate it with struggle. When I had a chance to get out, I was elated.

I'm the band leader. That's not to say that the other people are my minions - they all put in a tremendous amount of personality, and push the music in ways I would never expect.

I'm always trying to push myself into unfamiliar places with the music, sometimes without success, I have to admit. But I'd rather be there than relying on a style that people recognize and want to follow.

I'm a producer in the old-school way - not just some slacker working on Pro Tools.

I got involved, for the most part, in the actual song construction, lyrics even. I didn't want to write the lyrics, but if there was a howler in there, I definitely pointed it out. Just trying to bring it up to a higher level. Of course, after a couple records, people get fed up with that. That's fine.

Playing an old record doesn't interest me at all. It's exactly the opposite of what I want to do.