Over the years, I've had fairly benign record companies who gave me a lot of rope, but in spite of that, there's still restrictions and expectations. It's nice to be at the cottage-industry size, which I think is kind of the business model of the age anyway. It's the way to be. The Internet makes a lot of that possible. Having a loyal fan base is also very useful to keep me operating; people can find your website, and the venues that you're playing at, the merchandise you have for sale, all that kind of stuff. It's great to be able to reach the audience in a more direct way.

I'm glad I can do both full-band electric and solo acoustic performances. It's nice to have contrast, so if you get fed up with one, you can just switch to the other one. It's great to go to a town and play an acoustic show, and then you can come back a year later and play electric, and the show's really fairly different. The repertoire will be 50 percent different. The musical energy is completely different.

When you stand up acoustic in front of an audience, you really are a man without any clothes on. And that can be fun - it depends how much of an exhibitionist you are, I suppose. I quite enjoy it.

I think you can refine what you do, and become more consistent. And you write better songs that have a better shape and a better feeling. You evolve into and out of things, and go through stages, but, ultimately, you do improve.

As the writer, you're always a presence in the song. If you get close to what human beings are like, you're writing about common experience. We all do much the same things, so if you nail somebody, then you've also nailed yourself.

But music can save your life sometimes. It probably saved me from working in a bank or something. That's a kind of salvation right there.

I think the reason kids get into drugs and smoking is they don't have anything to do.