We definitely classify things in order to get closer to what we believe in - so it serves a purpose to really think about one style of music, and to understand the shades of delineation between similar artists. But yeah, it's really nice to listen to something the way most people listen to music! Just to enjoy it, without having to put it in context.

I've thought about doing a subscription service, where people pre-pay and then we send them 12"s as they're finished, with one song on each side. That would be really fun. But we'll need a significant time off from touring to be able to fulfill that.

We're covering all our bases so we can do whatever we want next time. That's how we're looking at it, rather than this just being an endless number of album/tour cycles.

Our vocal harmonies started to feel like a cop-out: all group-singing, all the time.

We're going out to play all the places where people might want to see us, because next time we might not just think about hitting every market or how we can make the most money.

Our day-to-day lives recording and touring aren't that different from those of Metallica, even though the perceived worldview is totally different. So that can be a difficult thing to reconcile sometimes.

You want to make music that reflects your ideals, but considering the isolating process of recording and the time and energy requirements of touring, there aren't a lot of opportunities to express those ideals anywhere but the music itself.