When I was young, my ambitions were very modest. I thought, 'If only I could play at the battle of the bands at the Y, that would be the culmination of existence!' And then the roller rink, and you work your way up branch by branch.
People don't realize the limitations of 200 words, and the way they get chiselled down into a song that has to be sung.
You have to know when you're at the top of your particular mountain, I guess. Maybe not the summit, but as high as you can go.
What I've learned over the years is that the craft of songwriting is trying to take the personal and make it universal - or in the case of telling a story, taking the universal and making it personal.
Rudimental snare work is something I've always loved.
Ever since I was a kid, I always wanted to play music that I liked, and even when I was in cover bands when I was a teenager we only played cover tunes that we liked. That was the simple morality that I grew up with.
