Every album is difficult. If it was easy, we'd make one a month.

I'm a minimalist at heart. If a song doesn't need a solo, I'm not going to force one into it.

Why is the rabbit unafraid? Because he's smarter than the panther.

Running my hands really fast up and down the fretboard... I mean, anybody can do that. It's the Guitar Olympics, and I can't think of anything more pointless.

The big cop-out would be to accept popularity rather than opting to try to create potent work. It's so easy to do the popular thing, the expected thing, and that's where you start to cheat yourself - and your fans, in the end - because there's an inherent dishonesty in pandering and dishing up what everyone's expecting.

Clarity of vision - what you've been looking at from the wrong angle and not seen at all.

First love is alright, as far as it goes. Last love – that’s the one I’m interested in.

If there is a perfect book to start the year with it has to be Rebecca Mead's My Life in Middlemarch.