When I started having a couple of beers and loosening up, I realized how many years I had wasted going back to my hotel room alone when I could have gone and just had a beer or two.
When I go on a nostalgia trip it’s not aesthetic. For me it’s about trying to recapture the smell or the feeling of something that I’ve experienced in the past personally.
The sober guy is always going to have this air of arrogance or self-righteousness, but it’s not my intention. I just knew that if I drank, I’d have a drinking problem.
I read a lot – surveys of vernacular music. A lot of it is the Harry Smith Anthology of American Folk Music, which I’ve loved since I was in high school.
When I got hit by the car, I became depressed. As a result, I’ve been on antidepressants and I feel like I have no sexuality left. People complain about that side effect, but I love it. I feel outside of society.
They had it at the library and I always thought that was interesting, even when I was into punk and stuff. Just the history of storytelling and the amount of melancholy a lot of old music has.
The first thing I think I ever played in public, aside from singing in church, would have been – and this is a true story – when I was about nine or 10 years old, I was obsessed with Twin Peaks.
