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Every time I tried writing my own songs, they would come out very country. I couldn't fight it, and the more I listened to country music, the more I loved it, and it just became very natural.

Well the country songs themselves are three-chord stories, ballads which are mostly sad. If you are already feeling sorry for yourself when you listen to them they will take you to an even sadder place.

Within the songwriting community, there are these unwritten rules for the way that a song should be written in country music, and I think that those rules are constantly being broken over the years, and the molds change and the process is evolving.

Most country songs, certainly all the stuff I've written, are stories driven by characters.

Some artists will tell you that's all they want to do is write their own music, and that's great, but George Strait, Kenny Chesney, Tim McGraw, Garth Brooks, they didn't write everything they recorded, and they've had major, major careers. I think it's all about the best song.

My wife grew up loving country music, so I always run songs by her whether I wrote it or if somebody pitched it to me.

Country music busts the wall between performer and audience. There's a connection because there's a vulnerability, a confessional quality, to so much of the songwriting. Those lyrics take you in.

I don't sit down to write a country song. I don't sit down to write a rap song. I just sit down to write a song, you know what I mean? And I try to make that song the best it can be.

I was obsessed with country music when I was a kid, and it's definitely had a huge influence on the way I write songs. I was always attracted to songs that had a brilliant pun or a clever turn of phrase, but came from a dark, bitter place. As a writer, I've always gravitated towards that feeling.

I'm a serious aficionada of country music - Reba McEntire, Toby Keith, Montgomery Gentry. I've even written some songs. They haven't done anything of mine yet. But it's only a matter of time.