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I'm a big fan of Bruce Springsteen and Tom Petty, they're my two favorites.

Great classic music that I've been turned on to has not only inspired and influenced me, but it has had an effect on my songwriting.

Both Springsteen and Michael Jackson, who had these huge productions, could always scale them back down to just a song and a melody. All of that influences me. I also try to be a fictional writer, and sometimes I get close, but the things that resonate the most with me - and with everyone else - is what's real.

I love the pioneers like Sam Cooke and Otis Redding, but when I write music, it comes out in my own way.

My dad listened to a lot of James Taylor when I was growing up. We had a couple of his cassettes in the car, and we'd go on a lot of long family car trips. It was either strange musicals or James Taylor - or Whitney Houston. It was quite the combination there.

Heartbreak was the impetus to me writing poems and music in the first place. Over the years, I had my heart broken so badly that if I didn't find a way to get all the pain out, I was going to lose my mind. I was crazy! Like, wanting to slash tires and smash car windows. Crazy! I was so hurt that I had to write.

I loved a lot of different kinds of music, but for my own thing, I went for the singer-songwriters.

Growing up, I was inspired by The Beatles and Bob Dylan. Damian Rice was a huge influence for me musically.

I've always loved both writing and songwriting. The journey is fascinating to me.

As a younger person, I was obsessed with Ray Bradbury, and I think his stories did more to shape me as a storyteller than anybody else - even though, when I read them now, a lot of them seem overly sentimental. But that's probably the writer that I've thought about the most, even though I don't necessarily like a lot of his work.