My Morning Jacket Call Hiatus a 'Really Good Move'

My Morning Jacket drummer Patrick Hallahan doesn't think he could make it through one of his band's shows as a fan. MMJ, after all, has garnered a reputation for long shows -- including a 4-hour marathon at Bonnaroo in 2008 -- and as a concertgoer, that's just too long for him.

"I can't understand how people can stick around for a long show like that," he says. "I don't really have the attention span for it. I could not stick around for a My Morning Jacket show. I would leave after an hour and a half."

Of course, he's perfectly fine performing those lengthy shows.

"That last tour that we did was just us on the bill so we could play as long or as short as we wanted to," he says. "Usually it ended up pretty long, just out of shear love for playing. That's why we got started in this whole thing in the first place -- it's just so much fun to get up there and emote for three hours."

MMJ, which begins another tour April 20, garnered a reputation for extensive touring in the early 2000s. That grueling pace contributed to the near demise of the band when two members -- Johnny Quaid and Danny Cash -- quit the band in 2004 after getting burnt out performing. With that in mind, Hallahan says, the band decided to take a break last year.

"Life was throwing little warning signs in front of us that we were touring too long," he says. "Up until that point we hadn't really stopped touring in nine years, so in retrospect, it was a really, really good move. I'm happy we did it."