I had an indie pop phase, I had just about every phase you could think of.

When I did the video for Piledriver Waltz, I was thinking about rodeo clowns, and how they're risking their lives just to keep an entire arena laughing. They're in danger!

I was probably 16.I played - I tried to play these songs that I had written. And, this was a common theme when I was younger: I would write a song about somebody, and they would come to my show. I wouldn't be able to play the whole thing, because, there would be some giant, loaded secret coming up in like, the third verse, or something.

It was so strange, coming from Nashville, Tennessee, where I was playing to 15 people, to going to London and playing in this crowded little dive pub. I know Tom Petty had a similar thing - I realize, on a lot larger scale.

As a clown, you're letting go of all of your bullshit.

My new favorite thing is to wake up in hotel rooms, and write on the hotel pads. Usually, it's nothing. I leave it in a hotel and get really embarrassed about the maid picking it up, wondering what in the hell I'm talking about.

My Facebook page confuses a lot of people. I'll post a Beyoncé Knowles song, and, people are like, What are you doing?! This is bullshit, and I'm like, No! Beyoncé is the Linda Ronstadt of our day, you don't understand!

I'm not a queen of anything, you know.

I like buying iTunes. It's instant.

I have this friend who has a theory that lots of towns have energies. And, for instance, certain places in Alabama have bad ones because they were built on reservations or built on cemeteries or something. But Nashville has a really gravitational, magnetic pull.

Love is like a promise. Once you break it.. it doesn't come back unless you really fight for it.