We're not like pop musicians who have to perform the same top ten tunes every night of a tour.
We've always prided ourselves on putting together a great live show. That's something that means a lot to us because our bread and butter is the live tour.
I once asked Ozzy Osbourne, truly one of my favorite people in the world, if he was cool with singing Black Sabbath songs year after year, whether he was performing with Black Sabbath or out on a solo tour. He said it was great.
It was great fun. We had gone on tour in between the sessions and reconnected with the audience and got a lot of energy back from them, a lot of positive energy.
The Buggles was much more a studio environment idea, which we never actually took on the road.
The studio and road both have their charms. The studio allows me to be a mad scientist and the tour lets me feel like James Bond.
I think the message of the Live/Counting Crows tour is that, aside from what's going on trendwise, if you dig a little, you can always find something to inspire you.
When you go on tour and see everyone, you're like, "Oh my god. This is actually real life." That inspires me to write more songs.
