There was an enormous amount of pressure when my first album took off, and I struggled with the speed of everything and the exhaustion from the constant touring.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
I felt pressured by continuous touring.
The success of Torn was a bit too much for me. I took a year off and was still scared to start the second album.
It becomes more important to me as time goes on to make every album the best thing I've ever done, so it's a lot of self-imposed pressure that also kind of slows me down a bit.
I still felt we had some really good music on that record, but it's a shame that we couldn't make it better. And the tour was a total mess. We just had no life, no energy, and I felt we were going through the motions.
In all the years that I've been doing this, I've never launched a tour and launched an album at basically the same time. Doing one of those things is enough!
I still look back and think, 'How did I win the Tour, going day to day under that pressure?'
The Beginning of Survival is my best album. I am very proud of it, and I am surprised at it, too. I thought some of Travelogue was a little heavy, but I don't think this is heavy.
What I was going for in the first two albums I didn't necessarily achieve. Because I was young and because it was my first time out. And the second album was such a 'quickie' sort of 'Let's just get it over with!' But the kind of music I make, there's a lot of subtlety in it. And I think it takes a couple of listens to actually really get it.
I could have taken the easy life and just done classical, but I felt very strongly about the album, my first pop album, the first time that I'd fused so many influences. I was very proud when it was in the charts in 25 countries at once.
With the first album, I wanted to do so many different things, and I was fighting with myself to try and see if I was worthy enough to do it.
No opposing quotes found.