I used to be fast and loose with the term 'country' because I didn't know what else to call my music. I still don't.

I live in Nashville, and I don't know how many people there would call me country. I really started in punk and anti-folk, but one of the reasons I originally gravitated towards country music is because most of those songs only use three chords. That was the easiest place for me to start, but I'm always trying to expand what I do.

The only two shows I watch are 'Walking Dead' and 'Nashville,' but both just went off the air for a couple of months, so I feel like I have to be productive because I'm not sitting around waiting for the next episode of zombies or mainstream country music.

I think I definitely learned how to structure songs, just from listening to a lot of 1960s, 1970s pop music, although I'm sure my mother's watchful eye had a lot to do with it.

It wasn't my dream to make music. It was just something I ended up doing, and no one said stop.

I went to community college for about a year but I'd started taking music seriously by then so I dropped out.