I'm coming up on 40 next year, and after making so many records and doing music for so long, I'm looking for a change and a different perspective. And every now and then, I think I have something I want to say.

When I was a kid, my step dad started this business and would go out and get lost cows and stuff. He was part-time truck driver, farmer and cowboy. He taught me how to ride from an early age.

I grew up in Louisiana, and I grew up with a dysfunctional family with some very serious abuse from my stepfather, who could be a very beautiful person on one hand and be terrible on the other, so it leaves your soul troubled as a child.

It saddens me to think that there are children in America who are hungry every day of their lives. No one can live - and grow - withoiut such a fundamental necessity as food. If we Americans reach out to our own communities, we could end this crisis.

When all our tears have reached the sea, part of you will live in me.

When I first started, I was really nervous. You could hear my voice quiver. So I started drinking a bit and that helped. A lot of entertainers have a few drinks before going onstage and don't overdo it. Me, it turned into a bigger habit. But I stopped that. I was getting older, and I was thinking about my kids. There's enough roadblocks out there without throwing in more yourself.

It’s innate in me to be a Democrat — a true Southern populist kind of Democrat. There’s not a lot of those anymore. I’m not saying I’m right or wrong. That’s just the way I feel. The issues that matter to me are the social safety nets for people, health care, middle-class concerns. We need to take care of the middle class and the poor in our country. The chasm is getting larger between haves and have-nots, and that’s something we need to close down a little bit.