All my battles were with male egos. I’m just looking for equality, not to dominate. But I want to be able to control my vision.

What I do is unusual: chordal movements that have never been used before, changing keys and modalities mid-song.

I wanted to paint in a folk-artist-y way. My heroes were Van Gogh, Gauguin, Matisse, and Rembrandt. I think Picasso is about as a modern as I got. But I incorporated things that they rejected as well as movements that happened later.

Musically, I don't think I'd ever dry up. I trust my musical invention.

I know my generation - a lot of them, they're getting old now, and they want to think back fondly, they want to kid themselves. A lot of them think, 'Yeah, we were the best.' That's the kiss of death. That's non-growth. And also that's very bad for the world.

There was this mountain village in Russia where my music was getting in on some German radio station. I remember this because music used to get up to Saskatchewan from Texas. Late at night after the local station closed down.

Edith Piaf knocked my socks off when I was 8, but I didn't know what she was singing about.