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I expect if you're a professional public speaker, you probably wouldn't want to go onstage and sing and play drums.

I always thought it would be really cool to be playing the drums in the show and then have your astral body or whatever travel all through the audience and dig whatever it's like out there.

I'm super serious about that stuff. I mean, it's rare that I sit down at a drum set when I'm not touring, because we tour so much.

Even when I go do comedy stuff live, I can still feel the drummer in me about to go onstage.

Performing has been part of my life since I was eight years old, so that's what I think I do. I don't think about the fact that it happens to be in a bigger venue where people get to know you, or they think they do.

I figure it could become a self-fulfilling prophecy; if I make a successful arena rock record, I'll wind up playing arenas! I wouldn't mind being back in that kind of venue because of the kinds of things you can do with production. You can make your shows more interesting, which would be fun to do.

This is show business, and there's room for the shows and the personalities. But I think there's also room for music, for people to play music, and there seems to be an audience developing that's willing to go listen to music again, rather than just be blown away by drum machines and choreography.

People buy a ticket to see your show, so from the moment I get onstage, I can have no insecurities, because they're already there. You have to get people to listen. If they listen, everything's cool.

I'm too scared to perform onstage. I'm not very good with big crowds.

I'm just not going to tour. One point I want to get across to everybody is that I'm still going to make records and I may still do some events. It's not the last time I'm onstage. It's been a part of my life for too long to quit everything. I have done it since the '80s, and I think it's time now to maybe see if I can live without that part.