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I don't think I've ever laid out a batch of songs that pick myself apart the way that these do.

My music is my way to rearrange the world according to my own hopes.

Once I've written a song, I sometimes refine them.

I get a different kind of lyric from someone else that might make me go in a different musical direction.

Sometimes ideas are coming so fast that I have to stop doing one song to get another. But I don't forget the first one. If it works, it will always be there. It's like the truth: it will find you and lift you up. And if it ain't right, it will dissolve like sand on the beach.

My songs pretty much revolve in my brain most of the time - usually, whatever's coming next.

When I write a tune - and it's been like this for many years - I always hear in the back of my head some sort of vague, orchestrated, fully fleshed-out big-band version of the song with other parts going on.

Songs are really interesting in that way. Sometimes, they grow with you. Sometimes, you outgrow them.

Being used to scientific terminology and theory it was always natural for me to push this stuff into songs.

There's always a group of songs that I'm working at. Some of them are 10 years old, and some of them are just a few weeks old. I'm always trying to adjust these songs to some position where I can bring them to completion.