We released '1950,' and I felt so grateful for the response from the queer community as well as just musicians and people in the industry responding to it and validating the art I had made. It makes me feel super hopeful.
Having a sold-out show takes a lot of the pressure off because I know that it's going to be a room full of people who are excited to be there. The worst part - or the part that I'm adjusting to - is the actual act of traveling. The hotels are pretty trash.
I think younger women need older women to get where they need to be. I think women turn out the best work in the world.
When I do makeup, it's performative. I don't really wear makeup, but I use it as a tool to talk about gender and sexuality.
I wrote them kind of consecutively, starting with 'Holy,' and then '1950,' 'Talia,' 'Upper West Side,' 'Make My Bed,' and I was kind of like, 'This is it.' It felt right. It felt complete. It felt like a sentence. I really enjoyed making it.
I didn't have a lot of homies in school when I was young because I was gay and weird and mean, so I went to theater class because I was like, 'Yo, I need a hobby.'
I wrote about ladies who had come through the studio. I get asked, 'Is it a choice to gender the music or put pronouns in?' and for me, it just wasn't a choice.
I take my inspiration from New York, and I bring it to L.A. and use it as a quiet place to do my work.
It's funny 'cos I think a lot about kids who grow up with their parents being really important members of their fields, and they just go the opposite way.
I was like, 'I'm an academic!' I'm not at all. It turns out I'm not great at that.
I took some meetings when I was 11. I think what was interesting about being a young kid in environments like that was people were like, 'You're so sure of yourself! You're so confident!' And I was like, 'I'm 12.' Now I've got to this place where I'm like, 'This is who I am.'
I think that was my biggest fear - censoring myself and putting myself into a cookie cutter to be representative. But I think what I realised is we don't need that.
I think that everybody on my Instagram are lovely. These people are wonderful, like these kids... it's just unconditional love, and it's really sweet.
I'll just say I'm lucky. I've got the dopest girl in my corner.
You're your truest self when you're young, and when somebody says something, and you're like, 'Oh, maybe I'm not normal,' you shut it down. It's always a process to rediscover those parts of yourself.
I'm a great example of somebody who is gay but exists on a very complicated gender spectrum. I'm okay with that uncertainty, and I'm okay with existing in a gray area and not always being sure.
I've seen so many beautiful, strong, talented women stifled by male ego in rooms, and I want every young woman who feels that their music is being taken from them to know that they have a voice, and they have the tools, and that it's possible.
I remember my mum and I went to see the Icky Thump tour when I was young.
I've been working in music since I was a little kid. I would do background singing in my dad's studio all the time when I was a kid. I went to label meetings when I was pretty young, and obviously my goal was, like, 'No, we're gonna hold off.'
Queerness is the lens that I live my life through.
