Social media has brought back your song Headlock, but how did it feel in the early 2000s when you had to develop, publicize and distribute the Speak For Yourself album mostly by yourself?
In those days if you were lucky you got into music or style publications. The main attention I got was in the techie music mags, but then the track Hide and Seek was in The OC, Headlock got on the airwaves and I started getting recognition. Imagine having social media and all this no-cost advertising 20 years ago … but if I’d received then the kind of attention I get now, I might have made different life choices, so I don’t regret a thing.
Did you actually take out a loan on your flat to finance Speak For Yourself?
I spent four years making an album in my band Frou Frou on a major label, but it failed to earn back so I didn’t receive any payment. Producing a follow-up with that label would have felt like revisiting a failed partnership. After I got out of that deal, no bank would lend me any money. Then I realised that my home in Waterloo I’d bought for that price was worth an increased value a year later. I took out a new loan to make the album and had no regrets. Interestingly, after all the social media buzz recently I’ve just received my earnings from Frou Frou after a quarter-century.
More than 20 years ago, you recorded and toured with an iconic musician. How did the team-up occur?
I met Jeff when I was 19 at a music workshop in a French estate in the a region. I was much younger than everybody else and shy so I got fairly inebriated. I was sitting outside playing guitar very badly to myself and Jeff said: “Let me show you some shapes.” I said: “That’s impressive!” Later that night I ended up steering a golf caddy around the estate and colliding with Miles’s mum’s cherished planters. A week later I got a message from my manager asking: “Did you meet Jeff Beck?” He told me he was this renowned artist – I had no idea – who wanted me to sing on his record. I sang his song Nadia as best I could and did some shows with him. He was a kind person and I loved him so much. A lot of people from that generation are just so appreciative to have been able to do what they loved all those years, and their egos are very small in comparison to the amount of fame they had.
‘I wish social media existed and all this complimentary exposure back then’ … Heap, London, the mid-2000s.
Her autobiographical work is a unique, autobiographical song, intended to evolve over time every seven years. How hard was it to summarize a timeframe into one minute?
I’m unsure about my success, but I sat in a specially designed chair and asked audiences: “Which unwritten song matters to you?” There were hundreds and hundreds different answers, but all connected to life stages. For anyone aged very young it was simple responses like “cat” or “piano”, from childhood it was entertaining, 14-21 was about self-discovery and 28-35 “professional uncertainty and that maybe I personal reevaluation.” I omitted those years because my family loss in my 42nd year and I just couldn’t do it, but I’m about to release the concluding work, a lengthy track called that name, about my current self. This project is all factual. The line “Personal humiliation … I’ll never live it down” is about the time my acquaintance – took my embarrassing item out of my drawer and discarded it. Then everyone passed it around. I was deeply embarrassed.
How did you get the inspiration for that joyful music? It always pleases my young child whenever I put it on, so gratitude.
A formula brand that organization wanted to create a piece of music that would make children joyful, so they put me in a collaborative environment. I developed musical elements depending on their reactions. My little girl started some of the melodies. We’d taken her to the a museum so that’s where “the fun sounds” comes from. The sound at the outset is her amused by an animal. Kids love The Happy Song, but it calms stressed-out parents, too.
Were you really a rebel at school and if so what were you opposing?
It troubles me for some of the things I did. The final incident came when I told the staff member off and they removed me, but they still needed me to be the jewel in the crown for the final show, so I ended up residing temporarily and she was really kind to me. I just found residential education insanely boring. I was recently diagnosed with neurodivergence, which might explain why I’ve always wanted to innovate and do creative work.
What shades have you tried?
Probably more recently, actually, all kinds of vibrant colors. When I was younger I had self-image concerns, so like I’d wear accessories to make my legs not look so skinny or wear dramatic attire with embellishments. For the extended period I’d back comb my hair into a huge bush because I felt my head was too tiny. It’s only in the recent period I’ve realised I actually accept myself – I just needed to add some texture.
Many years since your last proper album. Will we ever get a follow-up?
Certainly, I did the themed project [The Music of Harry Potter and the Cursed Child – in Four Contemporary Suites], and a previously I made the music to an digital production called the project with my collaborator Dan O’Neill, who gave me a bunch of sounds like natural recordings, which we turned into a double album. I just got tired of traditional formats, but now I’m really interested in spontaneity and making up lyrics in the moment. I’ve spent thousands of hours confined while working and I’ve sacrificed personally. There will be a release soon which will be the conclusion of that phase but I’m more enthused by live creation.
‘I’ve spent thousands of hours caged up in the studio and I’ve missed a lot of life’ … The artist performs in that city, March 2025.
During that period, the pop star invited fans to her Rhode Island home to hear her new album 1989 while she plied them with cookies. It seemed a very typical thing to do. Had you discussed audience engagement when you collaborated on the closing track, that title?
No. I think, like me, she just enjoys public response. I’m constantly inviting listeners going: “Listen to this” It’s rewarding to see if something you’ve just created impacts people. I’ve had many supporters round to gatherings and I’m sure her fans are as nice as mine.
Last year, a piece about your ambition to use technology in concerts. Listeners had worries. Is it still active?
A hundred percent. When people think of AI they maybe think of this independent entity making all the music while I’m sitting there being a puppet. I see it as a partnership. Say I’m in a outdoor space and there’s {dog sounds
