I like to get everything done during the early morning hours and the early part of the day.

If you want to do a movie about aliens coming down to Earth nowadays, you need to do it with a smile. When Tim Burton did Mars Attacks, he tried to make it a little bit kitschy, because it's not scary for people anymore. It's not scary that birds will attack you anymore, but I'm sure it was when Alfred Hitchcock made it. And it still is when you watch it.

It's not really a conscious decision to do a quiet album or a noisier album. It's just something that happens, I guess.

I've always written stuff based on personal experience, but I've always disguised it by the use of characters.

I'm just the kind of person who needs a change every once in a while. I'm not comfortable staying in the same spot for too long. Even 10 years, for me, is a very long time. I usually don't stay longer than a few years in a place.

Photography and movies are a much bigger influence on me than music is itself.

I want the music to stand out a little bit more than many other bands do. I still have some stuff where I don't use the high hat, and I don't use any crash cymbals. It just makes for an interesting sound because you don't really notice it when it's not there, but if it was there, you would definitely hear it.