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of music. I mean, I love all kinds of music, but I would be working on a song and be like, Oh my God! I know that Push Push would just kill this song!” And I’ve been following her for years. She was on my list of people to work with. That is really in a nutshell how it happened. The voice would come to me once the music was starting to come together. I would say, “I know exactly who to do this with.” I ended up with just as many male tracks as female tracks, hence the album title, ANDRO. Can you describe your creative process? TL: My process is never the same. I will hear a melody and I will sing a basic melody and put it down as a scratch, so I don’t forget it. Sometimes it will come as a drum beat that I’m hearing, and I’ll just put down the drum, or sometimes a keyboard or a guitar part. It’s never the same. I don’t have a method. It’s always random and I love it because it just comes in spurts from different places. A lot of times a melody will come into my brain and I’ll just grab my phone really quick, so I don’t forget it. There is nothing worse than having these incredible ideas and losing them. I’ve done it so many times where it’s 2 or 3 in the morning and I’m thinking, “Oh my God! This is so good, there is no way I’m going to forget it, and I just go back to bed. And then I forget it! It wasn’t meant to be, I guess. [Laughs] I know exactly what you mean. I keep a notebook and pen next to my bed when I know I’m doing an interview. If I think of a really killer question at 3 in the morning, I have to write it down, because I’m going to forget. TL: Sometimes, on the spot, you’re probably thinking, “I can’t even believe it. I forgot to ask one of the most important questions. What the hell?” I get it. Yes! Especially if you’re a perfectionist and hard on yourself, like me. TL: Yes! Finishing a record, for me, is like letting go or putting a baby up for adoption or something [laughs]. It takes forever for me to finally say that it’s done. At the end of the day, you can continue to keep making something better and better, but I’ve had to work on that and say, “No, this is super rad, Tommy. Let it go.” If I had the chance, I would still be down in my studio. You appear to the outside world as an extrovert and the life of the party, but is there a part of you that is an introvert? Is being alone in your studio your happy place? TL: It’s totally my happy place. When I’m happy or sad, I will immediately head to the piano. It’s one of the most beautiful instruments that gives you immediate gratification when you start playing chords that sound beautiful to you. It always makes me feel better. Yes, you would assume that I’m the crazy guy, and I can be, but I really am introverted in many ways. I got that vibe from you! What is the best advice you’ve ever been given that’s directed your life? TL: I share this with my sons constantly because I see it in so many young people. I always tell them, “Be yourself, everybody else is already taken.” So many people, especially now with social media, they watch other peoples’ lives and try to emulate this or that, and say, “That’s super rad. I need to have that because someone else has that.” This younger generation tries so hard to be somebody or something, and they’re going in the wrong direction. The correct direction is inward. I just always support them in being their authentic selves. That’s my best advice. Be yourself above anything else, because there is only one of you and that one is precious. Just rock what your mama gave you. My sons live in a very different world than when I was their age, and nobody really said those kinds of things to me, so I think that’s cool advice. Speaking of social media, how do you think your entire music career and your life would have played out differently had there been social media back then? TL: [Laughs] Oh man! I tell people this all the time, and it is a fact and it is the truth, that we got away with… when I say murder, I mean everything but the act of physically killing somebody [laughs]. We carried on and we did anything and everything you could possibly imagine, because there wasn’t social media. People were not carrying around a cell phone that had a camera on it all the time. If you were going to take a picture of something you needed to take a picture and get it developed at the one-hour photo place, and even that wasn’t always an hour. Sometimes it was a day. It was a free-for-all before social media. You didn’t have to worry about where you were and Is this going to show up on Instagram in four minutes? A lot of fans that watched the Mötley Crüe movie The Dirt, will ask, “Is that really what it was like back then?” It was absolutely what it was like. And a lot of them feel like they missed out on that in their lifetime and they will never get to experience it. It was crazy back then. And when I say “back then,” it wasn’t that long ago before cell phones, cameras, and social media. As crazy as this is to say to you, it was a more innocent time… as weird as that sounds!