You can't shape it. You can't change it. Your life is what it is.

I'm not really into the numbers game of, like, what position our record is. But you find out at the end, you know? You're like 'Oh, all right! That's good!' We had a Number Three record. That's crazy! What's that about? That's exciting to me! I think that's good.

We want to be big... we want to be a big band, but we don't want to be your best friends.

I've always said it's easier for bands to make a hard stance - like, we don't do commercials or whatever, blah blah blah - when you've sold billions of records. It's super-easy to be righteous when you're rich.

When you're a musician, a lot of time people help you out; they take pity on you. Family members will kind of come around and are like, 'Listen, I bought you a bunch of groceries because I know that you're a screwup.'

I don't want to be the mayor of New Jersey.

You pay your bills and you take care of your family, or you're not a man.

I don't really hate a lot of songs, but I think Weezer has put out some songs I really hate because they've also put out a lot of songs I really like.

It's a beautiful thing, to start over.

Sometimes I get the bug to live in London for a year, or something like that, and maybe I will. But New Jersey's home.

I went to the Louvre in Paris, and I saw all the paintings and the Mona Lisa. You don't really see something like that every day. I was looking at it, and everything else in the room just shut out. Like, Leonardo Da Vinci painted this thing - this is unreal that he touched that. It had this crazy effect on me.

Every time I look at the Eiffel Tower, it completely blows my mind.

Springsteen is a hero to a lot of people in New Jersey. He's a role model - because he's a local guy who got out.

I grew up in the next town over from Asbury Park and five streets from E Street. My mother fed me 'Born To Run' with my Cheerios.

Everybody told us we would never make it. Even friends would say to me, 'Okay this band thing is cool, but seriously, what are you really going to do?' I can't think of anyone who believed in us, and that was fuel for the fire, because the more anybody said I wouldn't do it, the more I was like, 'No, I'm going to do it.'

Shoes are everything. You can tell more about a man from his shoes than his handshake, because they tell where you're going.

I'm a pretty private person.

The first time I heard 'White Man in Hammersmith Palais,' I loved the vulnerability in the music and the lyrics.

I like building houses, working as a carpenter, painting. You work with your hands to the best of your ability, and at the end of the day, you go home with some satisfaction: 'I built that!'

I do find that I tend to write about big questions. Why are we here? What are we doing? How do we relate to each other?

I must've been about 7 or 8 when I realized I wanted to perform in some way.

I sure wish I'd written 'One' by U2.

I don't envy anybody else's career because I feel they've earned where they're at and worked hard. I wouldn't mind Jack White's gig, though. He does it all!

Everyone should see 'A Nightmare Before Christmas,' hear 'London Calling,' and read 'Great Expectations.'

When you finish a record, I look at it like a photograph. It's already taken. You got it the way you wanted it to be. You edit it, make sure the light and contrast are right, then you just put it away, and that's your photograph. Then you don't really think about it anymore.

A lot of people get writer's block, and I think you just have to show up for work, sit down, and be like, 'I'm here.' You have to stay confident and positive that you're going to write something.

When you label something a singer-songwriter record, you cover many genres.

If you're just making a record to pay the bills, that's not a great idea because chances are it might not come out that good.

When 'American Slang' came out, everyone was like, 'This is the next big band in the world, and this is blah blah blah Bruce Springsteen Junior and blah blah blah,' and I was just like, 'I don't know what that means. I don't know. We'll see.'

Too many bands record an album and feel, 'Well, this is okay,' but after a time, they grow to not like it.

You just have to know your story from the beginning. You have to know what you're going for and be honest with people about that. Don't sit there and say you're gonna be a DIY punk band for your whole life and then move on to arenas; you can't do that because then people don't trust you anymore.

I would love to learn how to paint motorcycles and stuff like that. I really, really am fascinated by that.

I can't sit still for long and need creative outlets and think you should try different things. I mean, if you're a musician all of your life, you gotta try different things. I really believe you can have it all.

That's how I would describe myself, persistent.

I just like a good song, it doesn't matter. I mean, I am into girl groups and stuff like that. I listen to anything.

We come from that school where we don't believe we're different from you, and it's insulting to me on some kind of weird level that musicians are put on a pedestal.

I did the coffee house thing - we have coffee houses where people play, or we used to - and when I was 14, I started there. Just played all the time. Every weekend I had a show, or every Thursday. Open-mic nights, the whole thing.

The Clash will always be from London, and we will always be from New Jersey. But New Jersey doesn't create us.

I don't go to rock bars. Why would I go to rock bars? I can do that every night; it's boring.

Where I live, every band ever comes through, and you can see anything you want, pretty much.

I don't like it when people spout about the popular opinion just to make it louder.

I think some people don't even know what they're talking about, and they just start talking with an opinion, not even asking questions.

Tom Waits is someone who has really struck me, ever since I was a kid. He's really a big deal for me.

It's always Bob Dylan, Bruce Springsteen, and Tom Waits for me - the big three.

I think I lose myself in interviews sometimes.

If you asked me to make a Gaslight Anthem album on my own, I would say, 'No way, that's crazy.' I would never have been able to do that.

We built something very special with Gaslight, and we don't want to mess with that sound too much. But I've always wanted to do a record where I can put strings or organs or pianos or whatever on it.

It's all about knowing your audience. When I buy a record by a band and it sounds completely different, I'm just like, 'Why didn't you change your band name?'

When you're older, you realize a little bit more hard truths. You are who you are. And the people that like you, they like you for being you.

I like movies and radios and Bruce Springsteen and New Jersey. That's what I like, and if people don't like that, well, literally you can go on iTunes, and there's hundreds of other bands you can listen to.