Quote

I moved to Los Angeles when I was about 20, all by myself. It was exciting. I had this moment when I felt like I needed to put on my big-boy pants and just make that leap to see what would happen.

Hearing my songs in public freaks me out a bit. There was one restaurant I really liked in L.A., but I had to stop going there when they started playing my music. It felt kinda awkward.

I used to go around the country performing. I was in my 20s; I had no fear. But then I had a baby, and all of sudden, your life, your world changes; you change.

I started singing in coffeehouses when I was still in high school, in Santa Barbara. I took a job washing dishes and busing tables in the coffeehouse, so I could be there, and would beg permission to sing harmony with the guy who was singing onstage. That was the first time I ever got on a stage in front of people.

I moved to L.A. right after I finished high school, for three years, because everybody was telling me it was important to get down there, and then I kind of just decided for myself that I didn't need to be there to be doing this. I wanted out of some of the chaos that comes with living here and being an actor.

I was five years old; I got addicted to being on stage. I felt like it was the most wonderful place on Earth, performing in front of an audience, who in this case were a bunch of classmates, kids my age.

I always had this childhood image in the back of my mind of this fantastic place where all the things I liked came from; Orson Welles, jazz, all that stuff. Los Angeles is one of those places where somebodies become nobodies and nobodies become somebody.

It is completely a God thing that I am here today because for the first 17 years of my life, I never thought I would ever do music professionally. I'd always liked what my dad did, but I never thought that I wanted to do it, just to be different.