That song didn't just happen. It grew out of my experiences. 'American Pie' was part of my process of self-awakening: a mystical trip into my past.

But I knew - in the old days, if a song was a good song, I don't care if it was 'Yellow Submarine' or, you know, or 'The Times They Are a-Changin' or 'Don't Be Cruel', you knew it, you know? You heard that song, and you were talking about it, and you knew it.

In the autumn of 1970 I had a job singing in the school system, playing my guitar in classrooms.

I had asthma when I was a kid, asthma so bad that it would turn into pneumonia and I almost died several times. Nobody knew why back then, but now it's obvious.

The secret to being a writer is that you have to write. It's not enough to think about writing or to study literature or plan a future life as an author. You really have to lock yourself away, alone, and get to work.

I'm never going to stop writing music as Porter Robinson and I see 'Virtual Self' as more of a tangent.

I had a wonderful career.

I'm an artist, and the need to get inside myself and be creative and be other people is a part of who I am. I don't imagine I'll abandon that completely.