There's a certain vibe in my hometown; Buffalo is a city that has no illusions.

One of the things about live music that's so incredibly important and can't be replaced and automated is the common focus of a room full of people having that human contact and being immersed in the sensory overload of a rock concert.

I have this dreadful image of me driving down Sunset Boulevard in Los Angeles, with the windows rolled down, and our song comes on... and I'm sitting there listening to it and some guy pulls up next to me and thinks, 'Hey, it's that guy from the Goo Goo Dolls... he's listening to his own music. What a jerk!'

I have a very powerful form of alcoholism. I finally gave up and accepted the fact that if I even smell too much booze, I'm going to start drinking again. That's just how I am.

I went to a vocational high school, which is where they basically train you to go out and dig ditches. You gotta learn a trade. Well, why do you gotta learn a trade? Because you're not smart enough to go to college. That was the underlying gist of it.

I never underestimate luck and working hard.

It's really weird how the rock world is quickly becoming like the jazz world. How if you do OK, or get a tiny bit of success, that's considered a sellout, whether you did anything different or not.

Our society's sort of turning into a two-class system, where... most of the wealth and privileges are being concentrated into the hands of fewer and fewer people. And there's the rest of us... that have to go out and work and struggle and live and die and try to find some happiness and contentment and security.

We were so heavily influenced by The Replacements and by a lot of hard core bands like Bad Brains, not that we sounded like them but we were trying to play as hard and fast as we could.

Sometimes it doesn't feel like I'm in control but that I'm going along for the ride. And I'm a lousy passenger; I love to drive.

I refuse to listen to Rush Limbaugh. I listen to a lot of conservative radio when I drive around in my car. I refuse to listen to him because he's just ridiculous, just a clown. I love Rachel Maddow obviously.

So what if America loses its empire? We never should have had one in the first place.

If you go back and listen to the album 'Name' was on, there were a lot of garage songs on it.

The scary part of alcoholism and addiction and that is until a person is ready to stop, they're not gonna, and there's nothing anyone can do. There's nothing anyone can say or do. And the unfortunate part is sometimes people die because of that.

If you're really gonna live, you have to be vulnerable.

I was brought up by four older sisters, so there's trouble right there. We are Catholic, very religious, and that sort of colors my world and my music.

There's a lot of shiny, pretty objects out there that when you actually touch them, they just fall apart. And it's like, you need to be authentic, you need to be yourself.

I want to cultivate my own sound in my own atmosphere, where the clock is not running.

There was always a guitar hanging around the house when I was a kid. It was a much lower impact instrument than me playing the drums, which is what I really wanted to do. My mother put a stop to the drumming.

I mean my mother always wanted us to be individuals. She always instilled that into our brains which was incredibly painful for an adolescent to deal with.

I made a deadline for myself that if I wasn't earning a living being a musician by 'A Boy Named Goo,' I was going to get back to school, get a degree, and go on with my life - and enjoy the memories I had.

When I write a song, I want to write something that is really catchy and says something that might actually touch somebody.

Too many rockers put on the leather pants and shirt first. But if you write good songs, the pants and shirt will follow.

At its best, MTV puts a face to the names, if you know what I mean. I think if you can take the expression of a song much farther, that's great. And it's one of the only outlets there is for artistic filmmaking. But it's a double-edged sword. At it's worst, MTV is just a lot of TV commercials for songs.

I just feel really lucky to have had some hits because we had a lot of time where we didn't have them. It's better to have a hit. You can ask anyone - U2, Green Day - and they'll tell you the same thing.

I wasn't present for my own life for a long time. I wasn't there; I wasn't in my relationships; I wasn't in my band; I wasn't in my soul - I was disconnected from all of it. I would let myself live in a miserable situation forever, mostly of my own making. I made my own misery and made the people around me miserable.

For me, social media is a one-way deal. It's like all the traffic goes one direction and I don't care how many people follow me, I don't care how many people like what I do, give me a thumbs up or whatever it is. I am here to share a piece of information that I've decided is relevant to our relationship as musician and audience member.

I like Valentine's Day. It's fun.

I got into alternative rock in the early 80s, bands like Husker Du and The Replacements. Bob Mould's playing was a huge influence. It was very heavy with a lot of open tunings, which was great because I played in trios, so I used open tunings to get a fuller sound.

I've met very lonely people who have 10,000 friends on Facebook. And it's just not real. We've set up this artificial society in cyberspace. And that's supposed to be a community, like a real community. It's supposed to be where people go to get solace or friendship or have fun.

The first guitar I ever owned was a Kay SG copy. That cost like $35. Man, that was a terrible guitar.

We were never hip, which is fine with me. We aren't that interested in that whole situation. But all the times how we tried and failed to get across in our music, we actually succeeded on 'Superstar Car Wash.'

The good part about being a pessimist is, when something bad happens, you're never really devastated by it. And when something good happens, it's such a bonus.

Whether you are happy or miserable is completely a choice.

The only way you fail is if you quit. That has always sort of been pounded into my head.

I love the Smithsonian. I'm a real dork for that kind of stuff.

I enjoy watching Chris Matthews a lot. He reminds me of a throwback to the older school kind of pundits like Tim Russert.

As soon as we finish a tour, I think, 'Oh my god, I'm unemployed.' I swear to God, every time I'm not touring, I hear my father yelling, 'You're unemployed if you're not working every day.'

We're doing everything we can to help bands from Buffalo.

The first record we made in three days. We literally stayed up for three days making the first album. It was crazy, crazy, crazy for us to do that. We couldn't believe anyone would give us a record deal. I look back on that record fondly but with just the slightest bit of a cringe.

I'm ashamed to say, but as a teen, there were times when I had to go to the church and get help.

Performing with a hologram in a three-dimensional world feels somewhat strange. But you know, the experience of playing live in a room full of people is most exciting, it's something that the social media has not been able to recreate. There's some kind of intensity about it, something that the social media doesn't capture.

I was a bartender, a hot-dog vendor, a cook, sold magazine subscriptions.

I just want my daughter to be respectful and nice to people. I want her to understand the importance of being humble.

You know what the most amazing luxury problem in the world is? When you've got a bunch of hits you have to play. That means the show's going to have to be a little longer.

I get nervous around famous people.

Punk was key to the early part of me playing guitar. I was really into melodic punk-rock. I related to punk more than Lynyrd Skynyrd or Yes or Van Halen.

I really love Tegan and Sara.

It's a crazy world!

Usually albums are frontloaded with singles.