I'm a bit of a book worm, so a lot of the songs I write are inspired by books.

I've always recognised that I have influence, whether I like it or not, and that I can use it to do something good.

I had a pretty regular childhood, with a rad mum who taught me to love reading and thinking and laughing, and (as far as I was concerned) a regular dad who drove trucks for a living and did radio interviews on weekends and got stopped in the street a lot when we went out.

People aren't problems to be fixed. People are people, for us to walk alongside and journey with and help pick up the pieces with and, when they drop them again, to get back down and help them pick them up again. And that's real love - without condition and without expectation.

Obviously, it was a big life change for me and quite a shock to suddenly have these songs I'd written in my bedroom as a far-too-intense teenager all over the airwaves and see my face on buses, especially in a small country like New Zealand, but at the same time it was such a thrill and an honour knowing that my music was reaching people.

I often think that eventually I'd love to do some papers... my correspondence if life calms down a bit, but I think I'd do history or English literature... I've had enough of journos.

I think I was always an old soul, even as a teenager.