Basically, the reason I'm vegan is because when I was about 16 or 17 years old, I began to understand that we don't need to contribute to the killing and exploitation of animals to feed our bodies correctly.
I am doing everything humanly possible to try and get well, but lately things have just kept getting worse.
I am very scared of being outside my home for long periods of time.
I get by knowing that I'm doing the best I can with the information I have, for example, finding shaving razors that are not tested on animals.
I get very anxious and am scared in crowds and things like that.
I had to try and find a way to express happiness without sounding corny.
I have a theory because I was being beaten up a lot by people outside of school, it was almost like if I could make myself sick enough they'd take sympathy on me.
I have never had a social life, don't ever want one because it's boring. I'm just not very good with people, and you meet people every night who expect you to be this rock star with these developed social skills, which I don't have.
I have not really experienced any significant conflict with anyone in regard to my choice to be vegan, although going out to eat is hard sometimes.
I know if I don't tour people will forget the record and you run a high risk of the record failing.
I made a conscious effort to make a record that would affect people in a good way rather than the last one, which affected people in a bad way.
I never really paid attention to sales until the second record.
I really like going to different places.
I start sweating and shaking and having panic attacks if I am not at home.
I think I definitely got scared by the second or third time a doctor told me I was dying.
I try to stay positive by focusing on how much I'll appreciate my health if I get better.
I wrote... Neon Ballroom in that time where I hated music, really everything about it, I hated it.
I'm always active in trying to educate people when it comes to eating animal products, testing on animals, and the health benefits of being vegan, although I'm probably not the best person to be talking about the latter at the moment.
I'm lucky the arthritis happened at the time that it did because of the record.
I'm not a huge fan of touring because I don't feel that lifestyle, but I like experiencing different cultures I guess.
I've been told that animal protein would make my recovery quicker by my doctors are understanding of my moral dilemma with this so they're pretty supportive.
It just makes everything more pleasurable when you've got someone that emotionally is there to rely on.
It makes it hard to get over a certain period of your life when you are constantly revisiting it every night.
It's hard going to bed at night not knowing whether I'll be able to walk or even get out of bed the next morning.
Kinda when I stopped eating was on our second album, just as it felt like everything was so out of control.
My advice for readers would be to look into B12 supplements as it is vital for human health and can be hard to get, especially if you're a vegan.
My eating habits differ when I'm on the road purely because the right food isn't as accessible as when I'm home, so I do the best I can and take loads of supplements and protein powder.
None of us are really dumb and none of us are really smart. We're in the middle.
Nothing's really changed around Newcastle but we're away nearly every weekend now, playing gigs.
Reactive arthritis is something I've been dealing with for nearly a year.
So I went and visited a doctor and he diagnosed me with reactive arthritis.
The arthritis just went from bad to worse and went through all the bones in my body, through my spine, up into my neck.
The government should become involved in animal liberation but I don't believe this will happen due to the money involved in the meat trade.
The songs on the first EP were about the time when we were influenced by Soundgarden and Pearl Jam and all the Seattle bands, except for Nirvana. We don't really like Nirvana that much.
The touring for this album was definitely going to be the most intense touring we've done.
There are no big groupie fans or anything.
There was a demo competition on a really small television station in Australia and we won that band competition.
There was three or four years of my life where I hated myself and you know, would have quite happily ended it.
There's an inherent thing in me where, if things are going too smooth, I'll sabotage the hell out of them, just to make the music more of a sanctuary.
Though, since the first record, I've dramatically changed my expectations for our records.
Touring doesn't kill me and I can handle it.
We all really enjoy playing live and the other two guys really love touring and the whole lifestyle of it but it's generally a positive experience.
We met The Cult and were talking to them for a while. We went a few places with Offspring.
We never considered ourselves to be a good band or anything, we just thought we were playing for fun and we wanted to play music that sounded like Black Sabbath or Soundgarden or the music we were into at that time.
We sign contracts, ones that we are comfortable with and we make alterations to the deals to make them comfortable for us.
We were perceived as a post-grunge band.
We were really motivated to do something with this record overseas, even though I hate touring.
We've cut down a lot on surfing and we miss that a lot. We used to go every weekend and all through the holidays.
When I have a musical or lyrical vision I find it easier to accurately describe what I mean and express what I want.
When we first began and I was 14, my influences were the stuff that was in my parent's record collection like Deep Purple and Led Zeppelin.
With our first two records we backed ourselves into a hole musically.
With the first record, I thought that is what you did with records. Recorded them, put them out, and then you sell millions.
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