I'm still very affected and moved by their music - maybe in a way that's different from someone who grew up around it.

I just produced Criminal, this remake of Nine Queens, and one of the things that appealed to me about Nine Queens is that it was a performance piece, and that's the most fun.

We have to have a version of our own story that we keep telling ourselves that allows us to get up in the morning. This version of yourself is what you sell to yourself. I think it necessarily includes ... not looking at certain things. Everybody's got some blind spot.

I suppose I could try to be some avant-garde artist if I wanted to, but that doesn't interest me as much.

We're all standing on the shoulders of what other people have done. But you're supposed to take that and add your own sauce. It can be intimidating, believe me.

It's pretty clear to me that working as a director for hire agrees with me. I like it. The films that have come out of that, I personally like better than the ones that didn't.

I have no shame in making music that maybe, if you listen to it long enough, you'll realize you've heard this or that part of it before. I'm still very excited by an amazingly written song, so that's really the thing that I work on when I make records with people.