“I thought "Spring Is Here" would work with StoRMChaser, because I've worked a lot with young musicians, presenting them with what is in some ways complex music, and it's always been my experience that if you go at it with utter confidence and commitment it's successful. When you start, it's an enormous mountain to climb — sometimes we'd rehearse something for a week and then there'd be a gig where we could try it out — but the adrenalin and the excitement that is created by the process kick in and you're swept along with it... We meet every Friday and just keep pressing home, playing around, having fun. The RMC set-up means I can experiment. To have a band like this that I can play around with every Friday—it's a real luxury. It's something people like Duke Ellington had. Ellington had his band on a retainer and so he could always call them up when he needed to and say, "Could you come in and play this chord for me? It's a wonderful resource to have. I had it back in the days of Loose Tubes. We met up even when there was nothing new to play. It was like a social commitment, a very nice social commitment. It gives the opportunity to try out ideas — slow processes, rather than the usual thing where you write all the music and go into the studio and read it, nail it, get it down and that's that.”〔("Django Bates: Spring Is Here (A Long Time Coming But Worth The Wait)" article on ''All About Jazz'' website ), published July 14, 2008, accessed September 20, 2009〕