And I definitely have an affinity with the piano.

First, I'm trying to edit down about 7 hours of material which I made prior to the Cop days and find some way to get it out. This stuff is pretty out there, mostly sonic collages and tape manipulations.

And when that's working, the sum can be greater than the parts.

I do remember being in high school and trying to go to an Outlaws concert, but I was too drunk and ended up in trouble with the police at some truck stop on 95 in Connecticut.

And I definitely have an affinity with the piano.

For electronica music, David Linton has been doing this series called Unity Gain, which is pretty cool.

Yes, I was forced to take piano lessons for 8 years as a child.

I like to think that my finest hour is still ahead of me, so I can look forward rather than look backward.

But that's something that I like about scoring film: it makes me reach out of the parameters of my self, it requires me to do things musically that I wouldn't normally do left to my own devices.

And I think that I'd be a natural for scoring horror movies.

Also, differences of opinion can be creatively stimulating as well as frustrating.

When I recorded Contra la Puerta, I never really thought out doing the material live. Mostly because I haven't really seen any electronic music performed live in an interesting way.

In scoring, I usually start with a sound or group of sounds, searching out what feels right.

And I don't know where I'm heading. I mean, I've got a pretty good idea of what I want in life.

But in my college years it got to the point where my friends and I didn't do anything without consuming a massive amount of alcohol before we went anywhere or did anything, and you know that.

I don't think I really know just how cool Satan really was when I was in Junior High School. Now, thanks to Marilyn Manson, it's no longer a secret.

So, through playing with Cop I realized that there is a potentially interested audience out in the world.

But Contra la Puerta was done mostly in the opposite way, starting with sounds and melodies.

I'm from all over the Northeast.

I actually went to film school and was making experimental films for a short time, so it wasn't such a leap.

But things can happen in a band, or any type of collaboration, that would not otherwise happen.

As a kid, I used to go see all the jazz players, Oscar Peterson, Stan Kenton, Dave Brubeck, Dizzy Gillespe.

If the finest hour is now, then I'll always be in it.

I think that one of the strengths of Cop Shoot Cop lay in the different, and at times, clashing personalities, Ideally, I want to have both ways of working in my life.

I guess professionally it began when Hal Hartley used some music of mine in his film The Unbelievable Truth.

Then I took 8 years of French Horn, first jazz, and then classical.

I grew up outside of DC, New York state, and Connecticut.

Unfortunately, however, I have too many desires to make a good Buddhist.

I'm just like you, only I'm different because I'm me.

With Frat House, at times I needed to make music that would reflect what these fraternity brothers might actually listen to, but still keep it within the realm of a score; it still had to lead the viewer through the scene, or just help create the mood.

I've had a lot of highs in my life and a lot of lows, some pivotal experiences, and in ways I feel like I've already lived a couple of lives.

I wish people would realize that animals are totally dependent on us, helpless, like children, a trust that is put upon us.

Any company of my size cannot live without thinking it's possible to go public one day.

Books can capture injustices in a way that stays with you and makes you want to do something about them. That's why they are so powerful.

When happiness depends on a situation or creation, it is not happiness; it is the joy of action.

In the event of the death of a current or former President, like the recent death of President Ronald Reagan, the flag should be flown at half-staff for thirty days from the day of the death.

I am a dork in disguise; I love doing stupid stuff.

The Purdue education was fine, but I wasn't ready to learn when I was at Purdue.

It's really fantastic because families can come to my shows and they all like it. It's really weird.

In elementary school, I did well in science, but I was a poor writer. When I got to high school, I failed all my courses.

We do not accost a physician as we do any mere nobody; nor a magistrate as we do a private individual. We try to get some advantage from the skill of the one and the position of the other. Walk in the sun, and your shadow will follow you, whether you will or not.

Nose-to-tail eating is not a bloodlust, testosterone-fueled offal hunt. It's common sense, and it's all good stuff.

The threat from radical Islamic jihadists is real and needs to be taken seriously.

I feel as if I've been so inured to failure, because I fail more than I succeed. As with any kind of fiction, I throw out so many pages; I get rejected so many times.

I didn't know how to show my self love, and I didn't want anyone else to hurt me. So my tough girl attitude was like, 'I'm not having it.'

Choosing the narrator for a first-person story like 'Downriver' is a crucial decision because the voice has to be one the reader wants to listen to, and the voice has to be a match for the emotion you want the story to carry.

Hard work pays off - hard work beats talent any day, but if you're talented and work hard, it's hard to be beat.

The books that help you most are those which make you think that most. The hardest way of learning is that of easy reading; but a great book that comes from a great thinker is a ship of thought, deep freighted with truth and beauty.

Life's the adventure. You don't have to drop your bundle and go bush. It's about being brave within the context that you're in.