That's my goal, is to stay in a truthful place. And sometimes that means writing a silly song, or singing about sex or singing about environmental destruction or heartbreak, or my grandmother. The subject isn't what the core is about, it's about truthfulness and authenticity and that just comes from my heart and soul.

The center for me is my heart, actually, and my emotional connection with the work. That's where authenticity comes from. It's also the first thing that hits me about other people's work, or watching other people perform, "Do I believe the person?" Even if I don't like what someone is doing or if I don't like the sound, if I believe them, I do like them. I am able to appreciate them as an artist.

I just write about what comes up. Sometimes you're thinking about Palestine, and sometimes you're thinking about sex. People have a lot going on.

Every form of communication is for the purpose of feeling, experiencing, sharing. Everyone has their own intense journey through life, and you don't want to do it all alone. It's really meaningful to be able to share with people. Whether it's your political beliefs, or what goes on for you emotionally, or keeping track of history.

My identity is mostly as a songwriter and lyricist and singer. I also have a lot of production ideas but I have my own limitations in terms of what instruments I'm actually proficient at and what I can do myself, so I really love working with people on the production end; just really going for it with orchestration and instrumentation and production. That's where I see myself going: maintaining my integrity and abilities as a songwriter, but applying it to different contexts, to where I can put on a huge feathered costume and roll around in the ocean.

I'm a terrible sentence finisher. I think that's why I'm a songwriter. When you write a song, there are no rules, and I think that I talk as if there are no rules. But then I run this great risk of no one understanding me at all.

You're born and then you're on your own, you start having relationships, you're developing relationships to the world and your wider community, and then disappointing things happen.