Quotes from Devin Townsend

As a drummer, I'm rhythmically so disabled that it's hilarious.

I've been a workaholic for many years, but at the same time, I do it because I love it.

I'm good at what I do but, to be honest, not a whole hell of a lot else!

I'm not a big fan of options, to be honest. The more options that I have, the less time that I spend actually completing things... ultimately, I think, if you have endless choices, I mean, the tendency to just choose endlessly is there, and that doesn't do anything for anybody, really.

The reason why everything I do is so different is not because I'm trying to be provocative; it's simply a reflection of whatever was happening to me at the time I wrote that particular record.

The way that I write is I just write a ton of music in the background of my life, and then I just bring it into rehearsal. It's, like, 'Okay, guys. It goes like this. Let's smooth it out.'

I play keyboards and Pro Tools, if you want to look at it as an instrument.

Strapping Young Lad is a representation of me, just as much as 'Ki,' 'Ghost,' 'Ziltoid' or 'Infinity.' There's no difference; it was just a different period of time.

I've been making music for so long, and the main hurdles I've run when dealing with any public exposure is that many of my projects are so different from each other.

I've always been into easy music. When I was 15, the record for me was 'Hysteria' by Def Leppard.

The risk a lot of times, in my mind - and I may be incorrect - the risk of challenging people directly with their beliefs is that society is such that there's too many of us, so a direct challenge automatically engages people's defenses.

I'll be the first to admit when I'm influenced by something.

I love people; don't get me wrong. Individually, I love that interaction between people, and I'm not an ogre or something; but huge crowds of people, huge groups of people who seemingly have endless access to you - as I get older, I'm not really into that.

One thing that's really important for me to be creatively motivated is to find an angle. Some people refer to that as a concept, which it is, in a sense, but not overtly. It's just something I need to focus and hone in on, and the trajectory of what might be seen as a 'concept' gives me creative momentum.

My lineage is partially Irish.

Essentially, 'Z2' ended up feeling the way that it should, but it was through a considerable amount of trial and error that it took to get there.

Because I have been so pigheaded and so selfish about so many things for so many years, I've spent a lot of time being, like, 'That person needs to change. This person needs to change.'

Basically, when I did 'Infinity' in 1997, I had thoughts in my head that left me with a lot of questions. I've gone to certain personal limits with 'Infinity' that, at the end of it, I think, scared me. And I've made a lot of really kinda bad mistakes as a result of that.

I think that, as well as Strapping Young Lad kind of having the name for themselves based on brutality and aggression, I think there's also something to be said to the fact that every Strapping record is different. They're all different.

I love Strapping Young Lad. I'm incredibly proud of that band; I'm incredibly proud of everything we did.

What made Strapping Young Lad important, at least to me, was I was being honest about whatever was important to me at that time. In many ways, that musical process is there to resolve those issues, if you will.

The reason Strapping Young Lad was such a good band was we were honest about what we were doing.

'Epicloud' is the first record that I felt confident enough to include all those things on one record, so it goes between melodic hard rock to schizophrenic heavy metal to country to really ambient stuff, and it's all in one place.

To have the opportunity to be creative and clarify the nature of that creativity, there are definitely some long days, some 18-20 hour days with interviews or computer work, but I have a friend who is every bit as intelligent and creative as me who works at the mill.