Your music in the ’90s and early ’00s became anthemic for a lot of Gen Xers and millennials, even all these years later. What do you think it is about your music that engaged and continues to engage those people?
I put myself in every tune I write, and I try to build them in the way that my father built houses, which is to just make them sturdy and a safe place. That’s all I really know about it.
I have always felt that people from 15 to 25 are at the peak of their listening ability for music. … And that’s because you have the time for it and it means more to you and you put it in social context. So [they engage with] the stuff that is the most laced with thought and layers—which doesn’t necessarily make for the better song always, mind you—but mine is on the more thought-out side. To that extent, I think that kids are always going to attach themselves to something they can dig more out of.
