Music is my thing. It's my thing; it's what I love. It's what I do. It's football to me; it's Christmas to me; religion to me; poetry to me.

The weirdest thing I've been fascinated with nowadays is the new contemporary country music, which to me sounds like very strange '70s pop, and sometimes like rock music. But some of the themes in there - maybe it's because I know how the songs were written, but it really does sound like it was written by two or three people, with the idea to appeal to the most general audience.

Not to discount my music, but I'm always suspicious of the music that I make on some level, as to how valid it is. Or maybe not "valid," but how important.

I'm sort of planting Post-It notes all over my psyche. Do not skateboard wasted. Do not buy $10,000 rugs. Be careful what you say to journalists. You don't have to stay up until 7 A.M. - tomorrow is a new day.

To conceive music, to execute it in front of others, to make it so others can do it...it can be pretty humbling, and kind of scary. So yeah, I don't really feel in competition with anybody. Not because I feel elitist, but because I have enough self-competition. I'm always struggling.

Music is my thing. It's my thing; it's what I love. It's what I do. It's football to me; it's Christmas to me; religion to me; poetry to me.

It was never my first choice to be a singer/guitar player. I really wanted to play drums.