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I sometimes don't know what songs are about for several years after I've written them.

I usually don't write songs by people calling me and saying, 'Write a song about this.' Usually I'm just going with what I want to write, so you never know.

When I'm writing, it's the weirdest thing: it's not even a conscious process. I'm not even thinking when I write, and then all of a sudden, I'll have a song that makes me feel so much better than I did before.

I write most songs randomly. They don't always deal with something I've been through but something I think is important to tell.

I try to write down every song that comes to me, even though I know that every song that comes to me isn't a song that I need to sing.

There's this element of surprise when you're writing songs, like it's something outside of you that you get to be part of. And it's just exciting. And that's why I keep writing - because I like that feeling.

I tend to write songs critiquing myself. The best way for me to deal with stuff is to write a song about it... That's not to say all my songs are like that.

Very often, writing a song is a process that happens to me rather than one that I instigate. I feel a song coming on and, like a sneeze; I wait for it until it comes.

I tend to write songs that are about something pretty specific. A lot of them tell some kind of little made-up story.

I just write songs whenever I feel like it, whenever they come to me.