From Chicago Suntims.com:

Eloquent, cheerful and eager to talk for once about the music instead of the mania, the three Jonas Brothers spoke with Jim DeRogatis by phone last week in the midst of the tour that brings them to the Chicago area today.

Q. How did “A Little Bit Longer” come together in the studio?

Nick: We started writing this record about this time last year. It was right after our self-titled album came out, and we were writing all these songs. We knew that we wouldn’t have much time, because we were about to go shoot “Camp Rock,” and right after that, we’d be on tour with Miley [Cyrus]. So basically, we asked our management team, “How can we get into the studio to do this?” and we wound up bringing a tour bus out on the road that was retro-fitted to be a studio.

Q. So you recorded the album while you were traveling?

Nick: We’d pull up to the venues and things and do what we could do. Obviously, there were some vocal things that needed to be redone, and some drums, because you’d have the generator of the bus in the background. So when we finished the tour, we went into the studio to make a couple of fixes here and there, and basically the rest of it was done.

Q. Nick, you have solo writing credit on a couple of the songs, and a couple you wrote collaboratively with your brothers and band members. What inspires you to sit down and write?

Nick: Usually it’s real things, things that actually happened to us. “Sorry,” “Got Me Going Crazy” and “Can’t Have You,” those were all real things that inspired us to write those. And, obviously, “A Little Bit Longer” was really close to my heart. They were all just things we were really inspired to write about, and they just kind of come together.

Q. How about you guys, Joe and Kevin: When your brothers come to you with a song, do you add to it or can you tell him you’re not really crazy about it?

Kevin: We write our own songs, as well, and when someone writes a song, we respect that completely. I think for us we knew that the songs he was writing were right on, and we were never like, “We don’t like that; we can’t have that on the record.” That doesn’t mean we aren’t working together on songs; we’re absolutely open and talking about ideas. But we’re never like, “No, we don’t like that, let’s not use that.”

Q. Was there more pressure this time, having won the biggest audience of your career with the last record? Were you ever thinking, “Are our fans going to like this?”

Joe: We just try to write what’s real to us, and we try not to focus on what the fans want. We try to write about the situation that we’re in right there. We have the mindset that hopefully people will like the song, but we never know until they hear it themselves.

Kevin: At the same time, the fans are our inspiration, and that’s who we’re writing for.

Q. Sure, but once you become a band at the level you guys are at, there are a lot of people who think they know what the fans want, or what the Jonas Brothers should sound like.

Nick: We found a very nice home [with Disney-owned Hollywood Records], and they really believe in us and let us be creative. They let us go and do what we want to do; it’s really amazing. We feel like we can try — not anything, but we can definitely take risks.

Q. Let’s talk about the song “BB Good.” How did that song come together?

Nick: “BB Good” is actually a song we wrote with our guitar player [John Taylor]. Normally when we write songs with people, it’s because we’d like to bring them in on the song; we wrote with our bass player, with our guitar player, with our friends. With that one, we’d listened to “Good Lovin’ ” by the Young Rascals and we were kind of like, “Let’s write a song like that,” and “BB Good” came out.

Q. It’s a bit like “Please Please Me” in the sense that you’re talking to a girl in a relationship and telling her what you want.

Nick: It’s kind of like a very simple song, but it does have a lot of depth if you think about it. That was the whole point: Let’s try to bring a serious topic about a relationship and treat it more fun, and lighthearted. We’re talking about being good, “be be be,” but what we’re saying is that, you know, there needs to be an effort from both of us. We’ve definitely found that sometimes simple is better. We never try to overthink our lyrics in the moment; if we like it and it works, great.

Q. My 11-year-old daughter and I saw you open for Miley Cyrus last year, and she suggested a very good question: She wanted to know if it ever bothers you as musicians and songwriters that people focus so much on your looks.

Nick: Um, I think for us, we love that kids are appreciative of our looks [laughs], if you will. But we do see that they are appreciative of the music, too, and they really do care what we’re talking about. We get a lot of people coming up to us saying, “I’m actually going through what you’re talking about in your songs right now,” and for us, that means a lot. We write our songs for our fans, and we’re all growing up together, so it’s nice when that comes up. And your daughter seems very intelligent!

Joe: We are guys; we don’t focus too much on our own appearance! People ask us how long it takes to get ready, and it takes us probably as long as any other guy in America. We’re really quick.

Q. Nick, you started out singing on Broadway, which is very different from singing in a rock band. One of the things I hate about “American Idol” is that there are a lot of show-tune singers, and when they try to do rock, it never feels right. Do you know what I mean?

Nick: Yeah. I think the training with the Broadway shows gave me great chops, but like you said, it is a lot different. At a young age, I kind of had to be mature and take some responsibilities, because I had a job. I loved it, but it was a responsibility, and it definitely made me the person I am today, to kind of take on this leader-type role. It was really helpful.

Q. But would you approach a song differently if you were onstage in a musical instead of at a rock show?

Nick: Definitely. I think even just vocally, how you sing is a lot different. Maybe someday I’d go back and do that, but right now, I’m really loving this.