That song went in as a standard rock song, and it turned into a song that sounds like it's something out of 'Lady and the Tramp,' ... It's got accordion and jazz flute on it. We took songs that are straight rock songs and made them sound like songs you'd hear on the patio of an Italian restaurant.

I always feel like with every CD we put out, we have to start back at square one. We feel like we always go from arenas back to small clubs. And we feel like we always have to prove ourselves, ... But whatever. You can't make everyone happy, and if you are, you're probably doing something wrong. And at this point, I'm happier with this record than I've ever been before.

Writing this one was a whole process for me. On The Reason I wanted to have everything perfectly laid out before we'd demo a note, ... This time around we kind of demoed the songs and left them as skeletons. We let most of the songs' development happen in the studio. And some of the songs changed just a little bit. But others, they became almost unrecognizable.

We started off intending to do a four-song EP with Will, with the idea that they'd all be cover songs. We did four songs in four days, which is pretty much the quickest Tortoise has ever done anything. It was such a pleasant experience and so much fun, and the results were really great. So we thought we should do some more.

Our last album was kind of crammed full of melodies, and for whatever reason, we felt like every song we wrote for it, the natural thing was to try and put a melody on top to make it real concrete. We've kind of been shying away from that. A few things we've been working on, we've left them in a more open area where they could be flexible. They don't have to be so grounded in a strict melodic structure.

'Planet Caravan' by Black Sabbath is such a delicate song from such a surprising place.