John: Is talking about it now something you'd rather not be doing or is it good? I mean obviously it's gonna happen...

Dave: You know there's been so much, so many things happened in the public with regard to other bands and stuff and people like the Pumpkins and Kurt Cobain and...

John: The guy from Sublime (Brad Nowell)...

Dave: ...and Sublime. In fact that was the same night as me I believe, you know that that guy didn't make it. And I think... I kind of feel like in a way that just by my actions it's more important for people to hear the album and see me active and doing things again so that people know it's not all doom and gloom. There is another side, there is a choice, you do have a choice. You don't have to keep going down that road, you know. You know someone said to me once, a friend of mine, Jon, who I got clean with, he turned around and said to me, "Your bottom's only as deep as you want to keep digging." And he said, "Dave, you've been hittting the concrete for a long while you know." It's true, it's a matter of being willing to try and make the change, and you 've gotta be willing, you've gotta if it's something that like I said you've got to work at.

John: It sounds like there were a lot of times when you were paying lip service to wanting to get clean, but the desire wasn't really there.

Dave: Yeah. Well I've been in and out for quite a while, quite a few years. And you know, the drugs stopped working a long time ago. And being the type of person I was, and being the addict, I've been described as being a hopeless, hope-to-die junkie, and you know that's the variety that often doesn't make it because... it's fear, you know. The fear of like accepting the fact that you no longer have any power over what you're doing to yourself, and that it isn't in fact working. In fact I think that done me a favor, you know... that the drugs stopped working, you know. Heroin stopped working a long time ago. But you're always chasing that first high you know and that goes away very quick. And then you've got to deal with just the constant depression and finding ways and means to get and use.

John: You talked about not wanting to fall into old habits and sort of withdrawing from people. Were you always sort of a isolationist kind of person?

Dave: That's something that I have created for myself. You know, I chose to pull myself away from people and places, all due to trust and this guy only wants to be my friend because I'm in Depeche Mode or whatever. And use that as an excuse, and that I found, when I started using heroin, I didn't need anybody for a while. I'd be lying if I didn't say for a while it made me feel great. You know, but like anything if you over-use it, the novelty is gonna wear off and the feeling is gonna wear off. So I feel like now I have a chance in my life to practice and to learn how to... be part of the human race, you know... be part of life. And try and live life on life's terms, which scares me, you know. Things that happen all the time have always really disturbed me about life and about people and trust and about putting your trust into people and love and marriage and then being... you know, I almost got to the stage where I was picking and choosing people to be around me that I could just, boost the effect basically. That would make me feel like, yeah, you know this is the way it is man, so you know... but that was my choice. Nobody made me the way I was you know, I did. It wasn't because of the way I was brought up or, you know...

John: Mom, or...

Dave: No, all that stuff, I really don't believe that. You know you have a choice every day of whether to get up and lead your life, or to hide... you know, the sad thing is a lot of people choose to hide.

John: One thing I wanted to ask you about the "NME" piece and then we'll move on but, maybe it was the way that he wrote it, or the way it was structured, but there were things in there that sort of made it seem that, at times, you were sort of just flippant about the whole thing. I guess it's important to be able to have some sense of humour about what you went through, but I didn't get much anguish out of it either, and I'm sure that was there as well...