If people can finally recognize you on radio without being told who it is, thats what you aim for.

I had a feeling about what I wanted to say, and I wasn't really qualified to discuss real things out of America because I didn't grow up there.

I seem to attract and be attracted to very willful, fascinating people.

I'm not interested in trying to have people who might like other kinds of music follow me. I don't want to please them.

Growing up in public is a test, and not many people know how to do it.

Guitars have been the obsession of my life. I first picked one up at the age of four and Ive been a guitar junkie ever since.

Coming from a working-class background, where my father did manual labor, was a good grounding; I was obsessed with getting a job or getting out of the house at 15.

Joining Modest Mouse was just consistent with what I used to do as a teenager: I followed where I thought I would make some interesting music.

I never took fans for granted. I always assumed subconsciously that people who followed what I did were just people who were kind of like me.

The biggest musical influence on me was my mum. We were both enraptured by music.

Now chart music is a genre all of its own and it's slipped away from what I understand pop music as. It's pretty difficult to take; it clogs up the airwaves.

The here and now is all we have, and if we play it right it's all we'll need.

The Secret Intelligence Service I knew occupied dusky suites of little rooms opposite St James's Park Tube station in London.

Backstage at the Victoria's Secret show is pure madness. Big personalities, big hair, and tons of press.

If one could have a wish, or an alternative life, I would've liked to have been John Lennon.

I must show no fear, no weakness, no doubt.

I’ll be marching through the morning, Marching through the night, Moving 'cross the borders Of My Secret Life.

Everything is in a state of metamorphosis. Thou thyself art in everlasting change and in corruption to correspond; so is the whole universe.

People who love only once in their lives are shallow people. What they call their loyalty, and their fidelity, I call either the lethargy of custom, or their lack of imagination

The trouble with life was that you didn’t get a chance to practice before doing it for real.

Going from playing a backroom of a bar to a show for 80,000 people...that's pretty wild.