I used to think you needed a strong image or something different in there, or something humorous, you know? I never thought about hooks or anything in my songs. But the longer I do it, the more I think you can say the simplest thing that’s been said many times before, and it’s the time that you say it. It’s just like … what can I compare it to … like in a relationship. You don’t want to blurt everything out all at once. So you kind of wait to say the sweet words, you know (laughs). And the better the time you say it, the bigger record it is or something. I used to think it was that you had to come up with an image that was really striking — which is still good — but I prefer now to do that just maybe one place in a song and not make it the center of the song. [From Issue 12, May/June 1995]
