When you're No. 1 or No. 300, you still get to play and write the songs.

I always thought 'Stump' was kind of like, you dropped something on your foot. It's not the most exotic rock-star name.

Why do we make records? Because we want to say something. Why are you in art? Because you want to say something. The second you don't have anything to say, you stop making art - you might start making product. And I'm interested in being an artist.

Lyrically, I personally lean towards venting.

Sometimes before it gets better, the darkness gets bigger. The person that you'd take a bullet for is behind the trigger.

I'm really attracted to music that sort of toes that line between pop and avant-garde, that pushes the envelope of what you can get in a pop song.

Everyone wants to pretend like they sprang out of the ground with an Animal Collective record in their hands and a David Bowie haircut, and that's just not the case. You discover these things gradually.