Good music is good music, regardless of where it comes from. I think that's a really important thing to carry with you.

'As Long As I Know I'm Getting Paid' is a satire. Lyrically, I want to be direct. With my history in Fall Out Boy, there's some expectation that I'm going to be lyrically obtuse. But that song is a straight-faced satire of consumerism.

I always think about opportunity and how you regret the things you don't do.

When you make art, you get really invested in it. When art happens by accident and you were just along for the ride? It's way more fun.

I am genuinely into soul, R&B and hip hop - all these genres that get slapped under the 'soul' genre. That spoke to me more than it did to my punk-rock friends. And punk spoke more to me than it did to my soul friends. I basically didn't fit comfortably in either world.

Stray thought for the day: Putting boundaries on how punk should sound/look is the least punk rock thing one can do. Be yourself=Very punk.

You have total freedom. It's like, if you do a solo record, there are no restrictions and you can do whatever you want, good or bad. You can have these passing fancies where you go in to the studio one day and you want to do something like what you did on the way in. That's dangerous. You have to have some sort of focus.