It throws you out. I'm left-handed. It's like writing with my right hand. What you write is going to be completely different. It's just different and I find it's really refreshing. I like to write while actually sitting at the piano, holding my guitar so I can go back and forth in the song while I'm writing. It forces you out of your pattern.

There's something really amazing about the right word with the right note and the right melody. It's like pixie dust. I don't know what it is. But when you hit it, it's amazing. It's like this tingle goes up your spine. When you hear those songs out there that are amazing, it's because somebody has found the pixie dust. To be someone who sits around and gets to make that their work is a really cool way to spend a day.

I enjoy going into the studio and working with really good musicians and not telling them what I want. I like to let them hear it and react. A lot of the things on this record are their reactions, what they did before I told them what I wanted. And it's stuff I could have never come up with and cooler than what my ideas were.

In composing, as a general rule, run your pen through every other word you have written; you have no idea what vigor it will give your style.

Perhaps if I make myself write I shall find out what is wrong with me.

I don't get paid on commission. If I did I'd be out there right now writing tickets. If I see them in the car, I'll let them know. I'll give them the warning. I don't sneak up on folks. That's dirty just as far as I'm concerned.