People always talk about how time flies; it's become sort of a colloquialism now. You don't really understand it until you reach your late 30s and early 40s - and I'm sure time will move even faster as I get older.
When I listen to and play the songs from 'Narrow Stairs' now, that record feels like a record where we had established a style that arguably was more our own than it was in the beginning. Going into that record, I felt a lot more confident in my songwriting. It was a fairly prolific time for me.
To set the record straight for the God knows millionth time, we certainly didn't sign to Atlantic just for the money.
I decided a handful of years ago that I just want to write songs that you can understand as soon as you put the record on. There's no need to veil what's happening in the song the way I used to.
I remember hoping there'd be 10 people at a show in 1998 when there was an incredible write-up in the local weekly. I don't want to go back to that period of being obscure and having nobody know who I am, let alone have to struggle to get people to come to the show.
Everybody has a language or code that they use with their wife or their girlfriend or boyfriend or what have you. It's a language aside from the language they have with strangers. I've always been maybe an abuser of alliteration, but I've always loved it and I like how those words sound together.
When we moved to Seattle, everybody kind of disappeared into different corners of the city and it was a very difficult time for the band.
I think a lot of people who become music fans have that moment where they break from their parents' music, they break from the radio and MTV - at least in my generation, they did, and MTV isn't really a thing anymore. And you discover something that defines you, that is outside of the mainstream.
I love San Francisco more than any other city outside of Seattle, but I've seen it go from a vibrant, creative community to a playground for tech bros.
I still love 'The Cure' more than almost any other band. But they were really, truly like the first band that I really loved and felt was mine, you know. At a pivotal time in my life when I was 13, 14 years old.
I don't want to be overdramatic about it, but I'm starting to see a lot of my bad habits get the best of me.
It's trippy to think we have an album that's 10 years old. It's even trippier to think we have a couple of albums older than that.
I think the narratives on 'Trans,' 'Plans,' and 'Narrow Stairs' moved away from the way I wrote on the first couple of records, which was a lot more impressionistic. I was writing those songs in my early 20s, so I thought I was being more clear than I actually was.
I'm not like a 90-mph fastball kind of guy, but I can hit 70 on radar gun. I hit 70 one time on a radar guy at one of those pitch-and-throw kind of things. I have a pretty good arm for somebody who's not a baseball player.
I think that the wonderful thing about music and about songs is that you can listen to a three-minute song whenever you feel you need it.
I would much rather hear a song that's written from a fresh perspective, using ideas that have existed in rock & roll for 50 years, than something that is incredibly abrasive to my ears but is new.
My goal as a songwriter now is to simply write some memorable turns of phrase.
I've always had a soft spot for Phil Collins. He's a great vocalist.
As a songwriter, I'm not necessarily writing about myself or my life.
It's like, how do you continue to make records that are representative of who you are that your fans will recognize as your band, while still trying to push things forward and present new sounds for people.
