I think I have to expand my creativity a bit, because it's difficult for critics to be, "Oh, this person writes their own lyrics and sometimes writes their own beats and sometimes makes her own videos." They funnel me through, "Oh, is it as good as blah-blah's record, which has had 50 million writers on it?"

Nowadays, [young musicians] are so quick to be like, "OK, fine, I'll take the cheque, or I'll get the stamp from XYZ, and I'm expanding my brand," rather than thinking, "I'm part of this space over here, and in order for it to grow, you can't have it assimilated by this bigger bubble or corporate brand."

I never pigeonholed myself - the only reason you'd want to pigeonhole is to monetize your business and, as a person, I don't see the importance of doing that. My music took off above the rest of those things: You can just make a song, put it on a CD, and get it out to all these people.

I'd be very controversial if I said why, and I don't do controversial anymore. That's too passé. So last year. Being controversial is boring now.

I hate the idea of street art. With music, I just needed my brain and my voice, which didn't cost anything.

When I came to England in '86, my first week of school was terrible because I would put my hand up to answer things, and no one would choose me because they couldn't say my name.

The music industry was invented, like, 100 years ago. I'm talking about the goddess Matangi, who invented music 5,000 years ago. She was the only thing that inspired me.