…Rebel? A rebel is
someone who asks questions. You know that Shakespearean line “(the
lady) doth protest too much”? A rebel is someone who protests too much,
or maybe not enough, who questions convention, who thinks outside the
box; who doesn’t take the road most travelled. You can’t be a rebel and
not be willing to take the consequences. Like Michael Moore said, “You
can’t stick your chin out and not expect to get punched.” That’s the
way it works. He’s a rebel heart too, by the way.
…Make Your Mark? It’s people like Martin Luther
King, Nelson Mandela, Bob Marley & John Lennon, who have changed the
world. They went against the grain. They took the road less travelled
and that made all the difference.
… Express Your Thoughts on Spirituality, Sex & Religion?
I think they are all subjects that beg to be challenged and dissected.
I’m constantly trying to come to terms with the ideal of spirituality,
religion and sexuality. These are topics that are very prevalent in
society, that are taken out of context in society, that are
misrepresented in society; that are used to help people grow and feel
self-empowered. They are also used to keep people down and imprison
people. So for me, they’re topics you can never exhaust.
… Liberate Yourself It gives me a lot of
satisfaction to know that I was somehow involved with liberating people –
making somebody feel proud of who they are or liberating someone in
making them feel good about what they stand for.
… Have an Opinion? I have opinions. What else can
you do if you’re an artist? I don’t know any other way except to offer
up my heart or say “Come on, you wanna mess with me? Let’s go.”We’re
living in the age where popular figures or pop icons or pop culture are
not nurturing people to have opinions. It’s about being a brand, playing
it safe and being familiar and not offending anyone and I will never be
comfortable being that.
…Really Listen to the Music and Its Lyrics? I feel
(that) on all my records I write songs that are revealing about my
feelings but sometimes I don’t like to be so literal or so specific. I
like to be more mysterious, so I guess it depends on the mood I’m in.
… Ignore The Haters? I think if people are looking
for something bad, they’re going to find it. As I’ve said before, we’re
living in a fundamentalist, literalist society where there can’t be any
duality to something. No one has an understanding to the meaning of
irony. No one has a sense of humor. There’s no complexity to things.
Everything is just surface value. Does it bother me that people will
misunderstand my songs? I like to think that my songs will find the
audience that they are meant to find. And the people who can’t
understand them or can’t connect to them, well, they’ll find something
else that they like.
…Strip It All Down? When it came to writing my latest album The Rebel Heart,
my original intention was that I was just going to sit with various
songwriters and write songs. That was my goal. I’m just going to write
songs and I want all the songs I write to be something that I could sit
and strum a guitar to and sing from top to bottom without any other
people involved. Even “Bitch, I’m Madonna” I could sing acoustic. It’s
actually quite good. So, that was my goal.
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