I think that’s what I do. I didn’t really listen to music. But the thing is, the album was made over quite a long period of time. But in the intense parts when we were working very hard and continuously on it, I really did sort of let go of everything. I don’t phone anybody up, I don’t do anything, my thoughts are just on what we’ve been doing during the day. At night you just want a bit of food and to turn off for a little while, or maybe not. Maybe I’ll sit and write based on what I’ve been doing the previous day. Depends on how fired up I am.

But yeah, I’m just in my own world. I’m very lucky because I can afford to be in that world for long periods of time, to have people around, other musicians, at the studio there, and just work flat-out. So yeah, it’s pretty all consuming. And I think the further I’ve pushed on into music, the more it takes, because you raise the bar all the time, you push further for something better. You find it, then you reflect on it, and you think “Did I really get there, or is this just another sort of failing better?” as Samuel Beckett put it. Fail, try again. You push yourself hard and you know in order to get that stuff of an equal potency to convince yourself, you’re gonna have to give it something big. So it’s just a very big commitment, and I’m happy to make it most of the time, but I think that just like everything in the universe, you sort of get out of kilter from time to time if all you do is throw all your energy into this particular sort of vortex and hope to catch a few things spinning out of it. You have to look out for yourself a little bit. There’s definitely not enough time in my life between the touring and the writing and making, I should probably give myself a break and have some fun, for Christ’s sake (laughs).

There are songs like Fugitive and Stella that are louder or busier, then there are the quieter songs like the title track. When you’re creating these songs, are you able to jump back and forth, or do you go through a stretch where it’s all busier stuff and then a stretch where it’s quieter songs?

Yeah. Stella, Fugitive, and another track that didn’t make it were all cut in a few days when we were highly energized and the pressure was off. We weren’t thinking of making an album, we were just having fun. This was right in the beginning of the process. And then other bits and pieces occur in different ways. So we do jump around. I think if you just do loud stuff, it gives you a headache, but that’s an aspect of what I do. I enjoy the parts where it’s almost pindrop silent, you’re recording so quiet that you’ve got to turn the gain structure up massively high because you’re hardly hitting your instruments. I love those bits the best. It’s like I only make noise in order that it’s wonderful when we don’t.

Speaking of Fugitive, you said something early on about how th song was inspired in part by something to do with Saddam Hussein, and a lot of people have said “Well it doesn’t sound like a political song.” What’s the real story there?

It’s funny how things, once they’re said, they just become something else. I think you can watch the news and see how a quarter-truth becomes categorical fact in about forty-eight hours. All I did was said that when I wrote the word “fugitive,” when I was saying that line for the first time, I had that image of that sort of grainy news footage of Saddam Hussein being pulled out of a muddy hole, because that’s basically what I was describing. But obviously the song’s not about him. Much as I admire his work (laughs), it’s not a ballad to Saddam.

When you wrote Full Steam, did you write that with Annie Lennox in mind, or did the idea of including her come to you after the song was written?

I just wrote it, and then realized I’d written a duet. And then it was “oh my God, who’s going to sing it,” because it was clear from my early efforts that it wasn’t going to sound right with just me, although I can sing the song on my own. But it’s not the same thing, it sounds so much more complete. We were scratching our heads for months about who it was going to be, sending people tracks and people couldn’t do it or didn’t want to do it. We sent a whole load of stuff out, and Annie was one of the suggestions. We sent her some stuff and she got straight back to us. Just one of those things you hand over to fate and see who’s gonna bite on the line.

Now she’s done it, I couldn’t imagine any of the other people doing it. She fit it absolutely perfectly. The wonderful effect, the sort of vibrancy of what she does, the energy she brings, her zest just propels you through the song.

You have a Twitter page and a Facebook page, but it looks like it’s just updated mainly by your people, posting links to stuff you’ve done, it’s not you yourself. A lot of artists think they kind of have to be on those sites.

It’s funny you should mention that, because people are always “You need to be more present on your website, you need to do this and you need to do that.” I’m like Jesus, all I do is fucking music, and turn up and play shows for people, sign a fucking autograph, you name it, I’m fucking there. You want me to share what I’m thinking now as well? There’s a madness to it, and I don’t know where it all leads.

I sincerely sometimes want to share things I’m thinking about, or things I’m enjoying, like a book or someone else’s record, or something. I think yeah, this is maybe the shit I should have on my personalized, perfume my website with these wonderful websites so people will know what I’m really like. But, you know, is that what it’s all about? It never bothered me. I don’t want to know what Bob Dylan’s really like. I don’t need to. I can just hear what he’s thinking when he makes his record.

It’s just like email, there’s a sort of corrosive fact to it that people just send off this shit to everybody and everyone gets CC’d, and someone takes a week off and they come back and there’s seven thousand emails. Well what the fuck is that about? It makes you want to shoot yourself. That’s the world we live in now, isn’t it? It’s overcommunicating not very much to each other. You could tell from this phone call much more what I’m like than if we exchanged a hundred emails. You’ll get a sense of the person. So I think ultimately communication has to be direct, and that’s what I do from the stage, or in other ways.

So much as I keep thinking I need to get involved in all this Twittering, I actually don’t think it’s a good idea. I think there’s too much shit out there. What are people gonna do with it?

You released Draw The Line late last year, you did a lot of promotion then, now you’re gearing up for another tour – did you manage to get any rest over the holidays?

Funnily enough, we had some shows on the east coast over New Years so there was a few days off for Christmas and then back out. I brought my family but it was like a working holiday. I wouldn’t describe it as rest. I’ve just come back. I had some work last week, I’ve got like ten days without any significant work, apart from a few interviews and bits and pieces. So this is the first proper break I’ve had. Literally, today, I’ve just started to feel human again, like I’m having thoughts, I think they’re called.

This year won’t be as crazy. I had like six months, June to the beginning of January, where it was just crazy. It does turn you into a bit of a husk of a person.

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