I grew up on a farm in a small town where you do or say one thing and everybody knows about it. You see it happen there's always the town gossip - 'Oh did you hear about so and so or did you hear what went on in this household?' So I learned at a very young age just to keep my mouth shut.

With the song 'This Christmas' I wanted to do something that was kind of different. I mean Donny Hathaway is an amazing artist. So I wanted to bring my flavor to the song so when people over the age of 45 or 50 hear it they'll be like 'OK he did his thing with that record.' It's like I can appeal to everybody and not just a younger demographic.

There's also some element of coming of age during the Reagan administration which everybody has painted as some glorious time in America but I remember as being a very very dark time. There was apocalypse in the air the punk rock movement made sense.

Everybody looks like clones and the only people you notice are my age. I don't notice anybody unless they look great and every now and again they do and they are usually 70.

Age gives you a great sense of proportion. You can be very hard on yourself when you're younger but now I just think 'well everybody's absolutely mad and I'm doing quite well'.

Everybody past a certain age regardless of how they look on the outside pretty much constantly dreams of being able to escape from their lives.

I'm at peace with myself and where I am. In the past I was always looking to see how everybody else was doing. I wasn't competitive I was comparative. I just wanted to be where everybody else was. Now I've gotten to an age when I am not comparing anymore.