I've always been trying to write songs that hit you in the stomach but ones that make people feel like things will be just fine.
I first moved to Denver to work with a group called YWAM, 'Youth With a Mission.' I was a kid - I was 18 - and did some work with homeless people. Really, trying to convert people is sort of an awful position to find yourself in, so I quickly, on my own, grew out of religious ideas.
My mom played 12-string and sang, and my dad could play pretty much any wind instrument and had a great ear for harmony. Soon enough, my sister and I got into music because we were always around it, and people were always listening to it.
Sometimes, I don't like making emotions your career; something about it is kind of gross. But, at the same time, I want to move people the same way the songs make me feel.
I toured a lot in the U.K. and Europe solo for a lack of funds, really. I left people I'd been playing with for years at home, just because I couldn't afford it.