Grimes Quotes

I love a lot of very sentimental music, but I shouldn't necessarily be the person who makes it.

If painters could be compared to filmmakers, Bosch is the Hype Williams of renaissance painters. With Bosch, there's always a narrative that is very nonlinear - and that's the essence of a good music video.

I like being behind the camera because I can control perception and what people see.

I grew up going to punk shows, that kind of thing - I don't wanna make pop punk! - but I like the idea of people going totally crazy and it being really intimate, loud and super-aggressive, but combining that with pop music.

It's kind of like I'm Phil Spector and I'm forcing a young girl to make pop music and perform exhaustively. Except, instead of it being someone else, that girl is also me.

From an early age I knew I would be unhappy if I wasn't doing something creative.

Basically, I'm really impressionable and have no sense of consistency in anything I do.

I don't think I know anyone who has a steady job in Montreal.

I believe the human mind is a very fallible thing, but it's the only thing that I can really know, I guess.

As a producer, I'm trying to challenge myself to just make something that is of a professional quality - not necessarily pop music, but maybe in the sense that Nine Inch Nails is professional quality.

I don't own anything designer.

I just watched another person I care deeply about basically turn into Gollum and my heart is broken.

I think a lot of music that's really innovative is not even considered because it was made by people who had a sexual image. And people assume that it's a commodified thing, so it can't be "indie."

I think you can hear, when you listen to someone's music, whether or not they're enjoying making it - it's so great to hear music where you can tell the person making it was just having a blast. That's really important to me as far as my process goes. That's probably why my music ends up being so poppy!

I prefer making videos to making music.

I only work at night, generally. Usually when I work [during the day] I'll black out the windows or something.

I always wanted to be really experimental.

One thing with Montreal is it's so cold and everyone's so poor and beer's so cheap: if you go to a show you have to brave the weather to get there. So you show up and everyone's soaking wet - there's a sense of 'I trekked through three feet of snow to get here!' I think there's a kind of camaraderie that arises out of that, that's important to me as well.

There aren't many other labels who I can say are that successful, and can give me as much as 4AD gives me, and still have such a great roster.

I've never lived outside of Canada, so I've been really cold my entire life. Most of my memories are coloured by the fact that I was really cold, just... all the time!

I know texture is really important, but I think texture and stuff precedes songwriting a lot of the time these days.

If you focus too much on development of the visual angle, it could be a detriment to what you're doing musically.

Usually when I make music, in my head I'm like 'this isn't Grimes, this is just some other project that you can release later, so there's no pressure and it doesn't matter and no-one's ever gonna hear it'.

I want to make Grimes a high-fashion sci-fi act.

I approach music - and this sounds crazy - as though I'm Phil Spector, and I'm cranking out these pop stars and forcing them to do all this stuff - except they're all me. But I'm not, like, transgendered.

I'm tired of being congratulated for being thin because I can more easily fit into sample sizes from the runway.

Fashion can be a really powerful tool, but it's also a place where you can be totally humiliated and have your power taken from you.

If I'll be sexualized, it wouldn't be because I was wearing sexy clothes, because I look like a baby. But music is an inherently sexual thing. If something sexual is going to be expressed, it's going to be in my music.

I grew up with four brothers, and in the back of my head I feel pretty masculine. It's always funny when I hear recordings of my voice, because it's so deep when I hear it in my head.

Most of my music videos were made for under $200.

I find it really hard to throw myself into something artistically where I'm making up a whole character and finding something for that character to do.

I have an intense desire to constantly make music, and I don't feel that way about anything else.

I would never go to a studio. I need my space, you know what I mean? I need to be able to chain smoke and pace about, cry and like... spit. Just make noise, make a huge mess. I also feel like if I was concerned for the cost of the studio - like, 'this is costing 40 dollars an hour' - I wouldn't be able to work.

It's important for people not to feel like doing things that are immature, stuff you have to try out when you're a teenager, is bad, per se. Demonizing it is one of the reasons it becomes such an issue.

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.

The way that you present yourself visually totally dictates your audience and everything that anyone thinks about you.

Sometimes you find people who are magnetic, but once they get in front of a camera, they freak out and get weird.

If you tell someone you're doing something innovative, they'll think you're doing something innovative.

Especially with music, people want confidence.

Obviously, I like things that are cute and aggressive at the same time, but I didn't want it to just be mini-bangs and lip-syncing in a dress. I need to get away from that stuff.

I'm so sick of my own music that I don't know if I can edit another video, which involves hundreds of hours of listening to your own song again and again and again. It becomes so grating after a while.

If you look at the way people behave at shows, icons are now musicians; they are the people that we worship.

I love humanity, I love the way people look

I think the internet is kind of redefining what it is to be a teenager. Because there's a lot of media that's aimed at teenagers that other people are getting into. But, conversely, pornography or stuff that's intended for adults is completely readily available to anyone, like teenagers.

By the time I'm 50, there is probably going to be a nuclear holocaust. I should just enjoy myself.

The most valuable live thing for me is when people look like they're having a good time.

When an artist, or whomever, moves from their scene to the bigger pond, it starts getting crazy, because all of a sudden people don't respect you, and you have to start being a lot more aggressive than you would normally be.

I just can't perform well unless I'm wearing jeans.