Christmas albums are not something you do frequently.

So many people release albums before Christmas and they get lost in the Christmas rush.

First of all I've been having a wonderful run of luck with cover albums songs I didn't write. I had five pop cover albums and two Christmas albums and they were all very successful.

For a Jewish guy I've recorded a lot of Christmas albums.

I don't know of too many double Christmas albums so it is something that's new and hopefully will be fun and there's plenty of stuff out there to cut.

Favored Nations is a long-term commitment. Our hope is that those who are passionate about real musicianship will want to hear and own most of our albums. We will set out to attain the same direct relationship with our customers that we have with our artists.

I think maybe because of the kind of music I sing people want to believe you're a diva. They can't believe after eight years and eight albums you're still relatively sane. I feel like they almost want me to throw something at somebody.

What I was going for in the first two albums I didn't necessarily achieve. Because I was young and because it was my first time out. And the second album was such a 'quickie' sort of 'Let's just get it over with!' But the kind of music I make there's a lot of subtlety in it. And I think it takes a couple of listens to actually really get it.

Country fans need to support country music by buying albums and concert tickets for traditional artists or the music will just fade away. And that would be really sad.

I was a huge fan of comedy and movies and TV growing up and I was able to memorize and mimic a lot of things not realizing that that meant I probably wanted to be an actor. I just really really amused myself and my friends with memorizing entire George Carlin or Steve Martin albums.

I want to be around for a long time singing and making albums and movies.

Movies for adults sucked in the 1980s and music for adults sucked even worse whether we're talking about Kathleen Turner flicks or Sting albums the decade's non-teen culture has no staying power at all.

Hip-hop don't have no fresh energy none at all. It's money driven everybody tryin' to make that cheque nobody putting art in their albums any more.

We got a little waylaid along the way. The whole problem started about 10 years ago with management and legal battles then still trying to make albums while I was doing all of that.

I've done a lot of albums and I kinda know when I'm onto something that was inspirational for me to record and create and this was one of those projects where I really enjoyed making the album.

Hip-hop's always reached out to kids. If you look at the last 10 big albums it might seem ironic. But when I look at the history of this music it's always had a lot of positivity.

My goals have changed throughout my life. At one time it was winning awards selling out concert dates selling more albums than anyone else. Now my goals are to see my grandchildren grown live a long and healthy life with my family and friends and travel the world.

I enjoy making solo albums because over the years it's evolved into more of a genuine personal expression of story-telling and day dreams and I work in a way that has more control.

I'm sick to death of people saying we've made 11 albums that sounds exactly the same Infact we've made 12 albums that sound exactly the same.

One day when I was like 9 I heard the Beatles on the radio and I asked my dad who they were. He told me they were the best band in the world and I became obsessed. He started giving me their albums in sequential order and I listened to them - and only them - until I was probably in high school.

I listened to the radio so I was influenced by everyone from Michael Jackson to Milli Vanilli. But thankfully my dad had a collection of Cat Stevens albums while my mom was listening to jazz.

We had a huge audience we sold truckloads of albums. If we do something that's cool people will listen to it. If we don't we would be selling people short.

It's pretty cool that people will pay for something even though they don't have to. It's totally different now to back in the day. Now you're paying for a record because you believe in the band. In the future that will be the only time people will pay for albums because there's some kind of connection.

I got a chance to have my dream come true and I wanted to make sure I made the decision as to when I dropped my last album. If I don't feel like this album is an incredible piece of work then I'm cool with the albums I've done. I don't have to put out another album.