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When you make music, you're in really direct contact with your fans out there, so you hear all kinds of stories.

I want to let fans know how much I appreciate them and how much I appreciate them showing interest in our music and me personally.

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.

Obviously, fans are the beginning and end for any artist. The minute your fans embrace you and accept you, you begin this ride of being in music and having a career doing something you love. You get to go be a kid and live out your dreams by performing music for fans who come out to your shows.

It's important to be a divergent musician and do a little bit of everything, except you have to make sure your fans are aware of it and that you string them along the right way.

I base my track-listing and what songs I pick by what my fans expect from me and what they want and what I think they want.

You've got to put interesting people around you; you've got to work with people who are gonna inspire you to take the songs you've written into a completely different direction, because there's nothing more boring than going to the studio and predictably knowing what is going to happen.

I feel like that's so important, to enjoy my own music. Because if I'm not passionate about my music, then it's going to show to the fans.

I'm certainly aware of the fans. I'm always hoping that what I'm doing is something they'll like, because I do appreciate them. But, no, when I get into the studio, it's all about what I like. It's the same thing that led me to the possibility of making that first Boston album, which was to divorce myself from all other influences.

I just hope that our fans are people who are inspired by music, and just use our music as a background or inspiration for whatever it is they do.