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The album also deals with the aftermath of Sept. 11. More than a year later, how do you think we're coping?
It seems to me that fires are being lit across the land, and a generation now has the opportunity to rise. I'm talking about a new way of thinking. We're asking "Is our country in safe hands?" After Sept. 11 we realized that we'd been so busy with our own lives, that maybe we had lost what we cared about. Now with the country at a crossroads politically, we're wondering where we're steering the ship.

Do you have a different perspective on American politics from living in England?
The one thing that keeps coming back to me is that the information you can get about our country outside of it is so much more articulated than the information you can get inside of it. If that doesn't make you question the land of the free! They don't need to burn books here, because they're distracting everybody just fine without it.

Several years ago you said your mission was exposing the dark side of Christianity. Do you have a new mission now?
I think now it's about playing a chess game with Those Who Are They. This is my country, too, and I will not be emotionally blackmailed. If you ask questions about what They are doing about our country, you're accused of betraying her. You're called un-American. I find that offensive, and I won't tolerate it.

How are you tolerating tracks from your album being leaked to the Internet prior to release?
It was only specific tracks, not the whole album. Within 24 hours of sending out the first six tracks to the media, they were on the Internet. So the betrayal was from within. I closed ranks and said, fine. Forget about how Epic thinks they're going to deal with this. This is how we're going to deal with this. We put the albums in nuclear glued gizmos so that if you tried to open the Discman, the CD would dissolve on impact and break and send you to the hospital. I came up with that idea. How do you like that one?

Why was it so important to you to keep the album from being file-shared?
Because the songs weren't ready to be out there. I wanted people to see what the whole story was and have the artifact of the album, which lets them access Scarlet's Web (CD-only bonus material) which has the backstory. Instead of moaning like everyone else about how technology can trip you up, I love the idea of using the CD to create resorts in people's heads. You don't have to be a victim of technology. You can make it the key to a world.


Posted Nov 13, 2002 | Order Article Reprints
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