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I’m attracted to the idea of drowning. Or rather the idea of jumping off and being enveloped by something, not bad or good, just enveloping. When I was a kid, I had a moment when I got under the water, lying on the pool floor, and felt I could breathe. I’ve been trying to recreate that feeling ever since.
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I always wanted to sound like a man, like Jeff Buckley or Tom Waits.
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I'm completely in love with the world but also terrified of it. It creates some overwhelming feelings. Wanting to battle out that joy and fear is part of my music.
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Love is horrible. I mean, when you're in love, it's like a sickness. Such madness.
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I like to keep my issues drawn, it's always darkest before the dawn.
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I spent my 16th birthday high as a kite, jumping out of a tree topless in my local park just because it felt amazing hitting the ground.
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Excitable, easily distracted, sometimes vacant, prone to gloominess and also extreme euphoria; I can’t be generous with time, but I try to be generous with affection. I’m really lucky to be able to be in some of these situations and it feels really nice to be able to take people along with me for the ride. Oh, and I’m a pain in the ass as well.
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Where's my heart at? Aw. Um, in my chest. I think it's in there - on the right hand side. Sometimes it's in my mouth and sometimes I can feel it in my stomach, when I get really nervous. So it's pretty physical.
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I think I just have a problem generally in life of wanting more of everything - more emotion, more drama, more glitz.
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A lot of the songs on the new album are about imaginary things, things that you can't touch - ghosts and rumors, my dead grandmother, things visiting you in a dream.
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Worst nightmares can also appear with your eyes open.
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The music is so euphoric,as a way of battling the words. It’s like an exorcism, beating it out with drums, shake this demon out, it’s so visceral because the melancholy has to be drummed out. I can’t let it sit inside me.
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My visual landscape as a child was the inside of a lot of these old churches. And the Baroque drama of the things was what I was first engaging with artwise. I'm much more attracted to the aesthetic of religious iconography than the actual religious side. The passion and the blood and the violence and the gaudy side of it I find really fascinating.
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For someone so conflicted, who am I to give advice to anybody? It’s such a funny, grandiose idea.
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I want people to get hit and caught by my music.
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I'm obsessed with choirs, and always have been, because of that sense of overwhelming vocals.
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It's hard to dance with a devil on your back, So shake him off...
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Everything has such order and everyone is so focused on doing what they're doing that no one ever pays attention to you spinning and dancing around supermarkets. It's something you find in places like supermarkets and airports, where everything is really ordered. There's something about those places that makes you feel really anonymous.
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Being heartbroken is like having this really horrible freedom. You can be selfish with your thoughts, which can lead to manic creativity, but at the same time you're just really miserable.
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I think "waste of your brain" is something that my mother would say to me occasionally - I think it's usually when I'm telling her something like that I can remember every outfit I've ever worn.
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I like a house party and fancy dress, a big fan of fancy dress, like dress up, costume parties.
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Sometimes I find that music is so much more attractive than love. I don’t know… It’s like some kind of euphoria, that love can’t bring to you.
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For me, ‘Dog Days’ symbolizes apocalyptic euphoria, chaotic freedom and running really, really fast with your eyes closed.
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All the words are already there when you're singing onstage, it's fantastic. You can lose yourself in what you've created. You're controlling this freedom.