Playing at the Opry, for me, it has such a history. It feels sort of like a coming-out party as a country artist. To know your heroes have played here is kind of crazy.

Steve Earle had a mainstream career. Dwight Yoakam had a mainstream career. Willie Nelson did. But they always made good music, they always stuck to who they were. They weren't relying on radio like a lot of people are in Nashville.

A lot of the songs are very rock-oriented. My voice makes them country, and a lot of people think that is a strange combination... I think it creates something different and unique.

I grew up in the entertainment industry, and I think being around that gave me a different perspective on people and what's real and what's fake. I think about that a lot, and it comes out in my songs.

When I was a child, my father would read out loud to my brother, my mother, and me. Several times in the course of my childhood, he would read 'Alice and Wonderland' and 'Through the Looking Glass' over a few weeks. They were a great favorite with all of us.

I didn't have my own journals, but my mother kept a journal while I was in the hospital, and my father wrote newsletters to keep friends and family updated on my progress.

I looked at films as a career from necessity but all I have really wanted is my home and children. The two things just do not work out together when one has to leave home at 5.30 am in the morning to go to the studio.

Is keeping Big Oil happy with subsidies from the American people more important than addressing our deficit? Should a billionaire who makes a multi-million-dollar gift to a museum receive more tax bang for his charitable buck than a middle-class family who gives to their local church?