I guess my guitar heroes shifted from people like Jimmy Page and Jimi Hendrix to people like Johnny Marr or John Squire.

If I start to go around and look for stuff that's being written about me or about the band, chances are I'm not going to find what I'm looking for or what I'd want to be hearing. If I go out and look for it and it's out there, I'm really going to notice when it's not. And I'd hate to think that that would impact any decisions I'm making.

When you stop worrying about all the things that can go along with playing in a band and you let go and do it because it's fun to do, things seem to work.

Slash can take three notes and make a beautiful solo. And that's one thing I've always really admired about his guitar playing. I'm a huge Slash fan all around.

Rick Nielsen, Angus Young. Huge Eddie Van Halen fan when I was younger. Jimmy Page is an enormous one who impacts me. When you grow up with classic rock like that and then you get into punk rock, you defy your roots and where you came from. I never really went through that. Even when I started listening to the Clash or the Sex Pistols, I still always listened to Led Zeppelin or Kiss.

We don't think about how the songs are going to translate so much during the writing process. Once the song is recorded, and once we're mixing, that's when it occurs to me. Then you start rehearsing to play shows. I never concern myself about how we're going to pull it off live, because I know we'll figure out a way to do it.

That's what's nice about playing festivals, too. You're on this huge, enormous stage and you've got 200,000 watts of power blowing your guitars all over the place. It sounds good.