I had a story-telling mother; she's written novels and short stories. So I feel like maybe I'm staying alive by telling tales.

There's a big difference between the Arabic and Western scales. One uses quarter tone system and one doesn't. So in order for me to compose real Arabic scale melodies, I would need an Arabic keyboard, and I don't have one. So I had to compose Arabesque melodies.

There are very few pop people I'm interested in working with.

I'm sure that a lot of my friends - even though they're curious about the music of nations that are not on their radar - still don't know what Kuwaiti music sounds like.

I still think you people need to be curious [in order to absorb the culture]. You need to search Uzbekistani pop music.

This has always been my problem with genres is that they've turned into marketing tools. I've never been a person that allows themselves to be in any kind of box and I think that genres can be used as tools to define BPM or something but I think they're suffocating of music and other art. And I think they're inaccurate when they come to describing my work. Maybe other people like defining it, but I don't.

For instance, members of the elite will never allow their children to become musicians normally, because it's - not embarrassing - but it's not done. There's a very famous composer from the '70s from a well-known family that disowned him, and he's a man, so there's this historical precedence with their relationships with musicians - not so much music as it's this abstract thing - but externally with artists.