I spent many years trying to write a lot like Ben Folds or John Lennon or Rivers Cuomo. I think that's healthy when you're learning to write and seeing how chords fit together and how songs take shape.

I was just learning to play guitar when Tracy Chapman came out. She wrote these songs she played them by herself and I so admired her for that.

Part of the joy of music is listening to lots of different kinds of music and learning from it. Specifically for me I like writing songs that move me and what moves me are beautiful songs on the piano or the guitar and really really heavy music.

It's interesting to do other people's music - that's how I learned to play by learning other people's songs. It's nice to delve into how other people got to where they are.

For me the most difficult thing is that I am learning melodies on guitar from some songs whose melodies were not meant to be played on guitar. Ever. They were intended mostly for keyboards or melodic percussion.

That was the reasoning behind learning to play bass and then after that it was more like it was neat to play songs together - for me to play bass and for him to play guitar.

I'm an obsessive hiker and I do it every day for two hours and it really helps me when it comes to learning songs or scripts.

I do remember actually learning chords to Beatles songs. I thought they were great songwriters.

Hollywood and the recording industry argue that current law permits the copying of songs and movies and sharing them on the Internet. This enables young people to grow up learning how to steal.

When I was first learning songs I'd have a favorite song and I'd take the chords and twist them around. I'd learn the chords and then play them backward. That was my first experimenting with writing a song.