I’ve been parading around, leading people, being loud, since forever.

I just love storytelling. I write music to tell stories. So when I’m done writing a song, I take it and go, ‘Okay. How can I interpret these lyrics differently?’ I love taking lyrics that were so close to me at a certain point in my life and then revamping them. I always want to take things to the next level.

I thought I would be in a band like Arcade Fire or be like Fiona Apple – but pop just made sense to me.

For me, every music video is a hurdle. Every time I do a music video, I’m constantly fighting to get my point across. As a gay woman, that’s also a big hurdle.

I love women, but I also respect them.

I just tend to date straight girls. That’s my problem: I’m a turner.

I felt like people weren’t going to accept me as a pop artist.

We all want to be loved. We all want to feel accepted. We all want to feel content. And life is hard.

My goal has always been to just be a person who makes great art.

I loved the idea of how all these guys always are stealing other guys’ girls and I was like, ‘There’s no female anthem for a girl stealing another guy‘s girl,’ and that is the coolest thing ever.

I grew up hip-hop dancing; I’ve always wanted to create music that I could dance to.

My mom choreographed the top Olympians; she‘s really the queen of ice in her world, so I kind of get my directorial bug from her because she’s really good at telling people what to do!

I just want to make art that connects with people and moves them on an emotional level. Any time I can put out music and place a story behind it and have people watch it and go, ‘Wow, I was affected by that,’ to me, feels like I’ve done my job.

When I approach my music and my music videos, obviously all of the subjects and stories that I tell come from an honest, truthful place and the experiences that I’ve had.

I think it’s just important for people to lead by example.

Everyone uses art for different reasons: We use it as entertainment. We use it as an escape. We use it as comfort. Everyone uses it for different reasons.

My hair has been this chapter thing for me. In ‘Jem,’ I have blue hair. ‘Insidious,’ it’s pink. In ‘CSI,’ I have blonde. I love changing my hair. It’s just hair and it grows all the time.

My friends call my style ‘old man chic.’ I wear loafers and stylish sweatpants. I love to stay comfortable, so I definitely funk it up, but I’m always comfortable. I wear lots of hats and feathers, and I kind of have a little obsession with Native American jewelry.

That’s the whole point of my trying to achieve success in mainstream pop – to have straight people sing to my music that has a ‘she’ pronoun in it.