I was not in a good space in my life, emotionally particularly, so I needed to do something to recharge my batteries emotionally and musically. I took a break and I learnt software and programming a little bit, and that's how I designed my live machine, which I've been using for years.

I'm not the kind of guy who likes to rush things through. I like to take my time and finish when I'm finished.

You have to sit with the songs until they start to live. Or do things straight-up spontaneously. I set up a beat just like I do in the live show, add the lyrics that I wrote in thirty minutes - I already had a topic in mind because I had this crazy experience with this girl who was trying to get close to me and it freaked me out because she was really close to another friend of mine, and I thought, "This is a story, I'm gonna make this into a song."

If I don't keep my music varied I go a bit stir crazy, you know? If I don't have the opportunity to jump genres every now and again I feel I'm boxed-in.

I feel myself developing more and more of this soul voice, and...it's a mystery to me. Fundamentally, I just think because I feel it, it's alright.

I just wanted to have some songs I could stand behind, and when I'm on stage just be loving it. People ask me why I did that and I think perhaps it's because Berlin is quite a gray place and I needed to sympathize with a bit of sunshine.

It's really hard to make something that doesn't sound like everything else.