Bands-- enough with the crayon face-paint-- you're better than that.

I think it's become such a part of younger people's daily life to have the instant access to each other that it sometimes gets a little presumptuous. People feel like it's OK, for example, to email you with some weird personal criticism they have.

I actually enjoy Instagram. I enjoy seeing what people who I have some connection to are doing around the globe.

When I started playing solo 10 years ago, I had some ham-fisted idea about trying to subvert the "singer-songwriter" tag/genre, and I tried to obscure my identity into the identity of a collective or band or whatever. That's part of the reason that I used to play with backing tapes and why so much of my early stuff was so awash in tape hiss and echo noise.

I gotta make a living somehow, and make ends meet. I accept the idea of having a retirement.

You play the one song that people want to hear the most every night, and for every audience that's a special thing. And usually that translates back to you.

I do feel like at the end of anger I have to have something that grounds it.