I feel really personally connected to all of the songs, so stepping back is really hard.
I think my philosophy on music is sort of like the difference between religion and spirituality or religion and faith. There's a lot of bullshit in the music industry. It's really tough to get a leg up and navigate around your gender and stereotypes. You feel hopeless, [but] all of that disappears the minute that I start writing a song. Then I record something and have that magical feeling. You have to have the negative and the positive. Trying to own that and go to that place in yourself creatively is the most important thing.
I don't think in biology it's very controversial at all. Whether certain behavior is culture or is not culture is argued. I think virtually all biologists would agree that some animal behavior is culture. Bird song is a good example.
I started as a musician, then I was a singer. I sang with the band. Then I was an actor in the theater, TV, films. But I guess I am a song and dance man. It's at the heart of everything I do.
I could be inspired by something I see or something I hear and write down or send to a friend or a writer or whether I have instrumental tracks or just a couple chords recorded on my phone. If I have a couple sessions set, I'll go into the studio with the people I'm lucky enough to call my friends because I feel like I can talk to them and then suddenly our conversations turn into these songs you hear on the radio. I still don't understand how it happens but I talk about my experiences and my situations and everything and then they turn into these amazing pop songs.
I often think it's unfair to the listener and "too easy" to just choose one tempo while I make and decide the songs.
I seldom speak on songs, as in when people ask me for fave songs. I really have only fave parts.
I moved to New York from California when I was 11, so initially I was seen as the California person for a while. I didn't feel like I was popular, but I did feel confident.
I instinctively want to create pop songs and I think it's really good to challenge that, otherwise it becomes a habit.
What playing solo has reminded me is how much I love electronic music and how much I love dance music. I'd like to move towards something more hypnotic and rhythmic rather than song-based.
I think we're definitely playing up to characters. We see ourselves as a pop band. I don't have a pseudonym because I don't really need one, because I've got a weird name, but everyone has a stage name, and it's about a certain amount of escapism, really. The songs are inspired by the personal, but because there are seven of us that work on the songs together, they end up becoming Pipettes songs, rather than about any one individual.
I don't mean this in a stuck-up way, but I needed an attitude song.
Out of all the artistic things I do, music is the most rewarding because it's so hard to write songs.
It feels like the more I'm out there in the public eye, the more criticism I get. You need to have confidence - that's what it takes to walk out there and sing a song in front of a huge group of people.
I remember so vividly the first song I ever wrote. It was called 'Different People.'
I think when I first started discovering I could write songs, I was so naive. And it was after I got broken up with and had my heart sliced up into a bunch of little pieces that I was like, "I'm going to say this." I didn't even know how to play guitar.
If I hear a song that I love - how is the groove and how is the beat and what is the feeling of this? - I can make it my own.
When I played my own songs, I had to do everything myself to get it the right way, but now I think it's interesting to see how it becomes music.
I've recorded myself for four or five years and have been doing lots of experiments. I'm not that good an engineer - so it always becomes a different song - but I have ideas.
I love music so much that I have to try to make my own music. And not copy music. If I hear a song that I love - how is the groove and how is the beat and what is the feeling of this? - I can make it my own. So then I try, and I watch it become something totally different. But that's the way I have to do it.
Music is for making people happy, lyrics tell them who they are. Everybody is free to interpret the music, as they want. The lyrics of my songs are about different things, but it's all about my issues.
I think of every song like a game. It's like a video game: "Okay, I'm going to hop over here and if I press this drum, or if I hit this note, then that doorway opens. Oops, I fell down a trap door but I'm in a whole new world."
I'm a big fan of new production techniques and new sounds. That's kind of what has been my focus out here; making sure that the songs can stand away from the production, however it's produced.
I kind of, I have quite a clear idea of what I'm trying to do with a record. A Super Furry Animals record is always an adventure, because there's five members of the group and everyone is a producer, we all throw in ideas, and regardless of who writes the song, the songs always get pushed around and shape-shifted to fit everyone in the band. So when I start a record with Super Furry Animals I can never predict how it'll turn out.
I have a really weird relationship with myself where I'll say, "Do it, do it!" and then, "I don't want to do it anymore, I hate photo shoots, I'm so tired of this!" Or, "I wrote a song, and you're gonna sing it!" then, "I can't hit the note." I want to be a behind-the-scenes producer. I really hate being in front of people. But I'm also obsessed with becoming a pop star.
