Most people want to be seen or heard. You want to shine. That's my way of shining.

Lyrics are back, maybe. It seems like there was a bit of an attitude that lyrics are not important.

It's just a compulsion to create something new and stay busy. I don't know how to do anything else. It was never exactly right. Those records came out in spite of their flaws. And because of their flaws they were good.

Some people, they've had a lot of fun, even if it was dumb fun and a shitty body of work.

George Oppen wasn't a larger than life personality, but I'm not either. And he lived a long time, so he was happy. Going down in flames is fine, too.

Almost every band has somebody who's the main songwriter and who has a vision, a very clear idea of how a song should be.

Traditionally, when we lived here [in Portland], we have a record player in the living room, and there's lots of stuff playing, all different kinds of music. I don't listen to any of those Internet radio things. I have iTunes on my thing, but I've never bought a single thing on it. Except for "Call Me Maybe," for the kids or whatever. Carly Rae Jepsen.