I like to quote Homer Simpson: 'I'm like a chocoholic except for alcohol.' I come from a long line of alcoholics. It's funny because when I first started making records, I was at the tail end of a period of sobriety, so I somehow got this reputation as Captain Sober.

It takes a unique woman to see me as any sort of catch.

I stopped drinking and realised New York still has a lot of charm, but it has become so bourgeois and affluent - and I can't really complain because I'm sort of bourgeois and affluent myself, but I like living in a place where artists and musicians and writers can actually pay the rent.

When someone comes to me and says the music I've made has affected them emotionally, that's the most gratifying part of my job.

The demise of the monolithic record industry has been, for a lot of people, really liberating and emancipating.

I know it's simple, but my main inspiration is just my love of music. I know that sounds overly naive. But it's true.

By being vulnerable, either with yourself or in the presence of another person, that’s where all growth and ultimate well-being comes from.