I'm not in the business of telling people what to do. I'm much more in the business of describing things, situations and stuff like that and leaving them out there, and you can make up your minds about them.

You write a scene, and it works or it doesn't. It's immediate.

It's an Australian thing to be dismissive. We find that endearing. Americans don't. They believe what you say.

There's an element to songwriting that I can't explain, that comes from somewhere else. I can't explain that dividing line between nothing and something that happens within a song, where you have absolutely nothing, and then suddenly you have something. It's like the origin of the universe.

I don't believe in an interventionist God

My records are basically a litany of complaints against the world, and I'm quite like that in real life as well.

Into the mercy seat I climb My head is shaved, my head is wired And like a moth that tries To enter the bright eye I go shuffling out of life Just to hide in death awhile And anyway I never lied.