Whatever you are making, whether it's a song, an album, a painting, a film, you're connecting with a tradition, and I do feel connected to New York music.

I don't identify as white. I have a complex relationship with whiteness.

When I moved to New York, I remember thinking, 'I'm never going to live anywhere else.'

It's hard to make music that's sexy that's not cheesy.

I like that I can write my name in Persian, and it's a small unit, like a graphical unit. I feel the same way about my name in English, it's a graphical unit.

I think the music that speaks to me the most is music that is personal. And that's the music that I'm trying to make.

I want to live in a world that is less white supremacist, straight supremacist, male supremacist.

I admire Brian Eno so much in how he seems to push the idea of less being more - his touch is to crack open a window and let the light in.

Even though I've been making electronic music since I was 14, it's hard for people to see you as a producer with a musical identity when you're contextualized in a band that performs on a stage.

I think as a producer, you're always sort of questioning if what you're contributing is something that an artist loves and elevates a song.

I think that's kind of the perfect mix, where you do something that you're not sure about, you feel like you're taking a risk, and then you turn around and look at the artists that you're collaborating with and you can read the expression on their face if they like it or they hate it.

My music is about identity.

Because of who I am, and how open I am, there's something inherently political about just writing love songs.

I certainly think that my music is a response to my experience as a person who doesn't identify as straight, as a person who grew up American.

The most exciting songs to me are the unlikely hits, when you think, 'I love this, but why is it on the radio?'

My parents left Iran in 1979 and moved to France and then moved to the U.S. My brother was born in France and I was born in New York, and then we moved to D.C.

I made a quote-unquote 'album' for my senior project of high school. As soon as I finished making it I realized it wasn't the kind of music I wanted to make.

Throughout college I was getting better and better at making recordings, producing songs, making different kinds of beats.

I like the idea that a song can be about a romantic relationship, but it can also about a relationship to your career, or a relationship to your city.

As a kid I had gone to New York a handful of times with my family. I definitely think it planted a seed in me.

I'm trying to get to a point where I tell people, if you want to get in touch with me, please don't rely on email. I don't want to be a slave to it.

It's easier for me to remember things based on the releases of albums. The year is such an arbitrary thing.

I feel like there's no one kind of person who comes to my shows. Sometimes I've been surprised by the people who will stop me on the street to tell me that they're into my music.

I don't think teenagers in 2017 identify with heterosexuality, and that's a positive.

I'll probably continue writing songs about New York until I die.

I work on music with different people, and I work on music on my own. That's my life.

Honestly, I never felt like I wasn't an artist on my own. I always felt like the music I made was mine, whether it was part of a collaboration with people.

Well, I think that I have a complicated relationship with whiteness because oftentimes, I pass as white, and I recognize that. I would be disingenuous to pretend that I don't pass as white.

I don't believe in expertise. I don't believe that a film critic feels a film more deeply than any person who walks into a theater. I don't believe that.

It's always my mission to try to do something that hasn't been done before, whether that's musically, lyrically or in terms of mixing.

I'm as guilty as anyone else of listening to music track by track.

The whole point of Lady Gaga is that anyone can do it. A few years ago she was a nobody. She talks about how it's important for people to know that by sheer force of will they can bring about anything they want in their lives.

Some of the journalists who've ended up writing about our band - and this is disappointing to say - have a very narrow outlook. And because of that they fundamentally misunderstand us.

Social media is something of a double-edged sword. At its best, social media offers unprecedented opportunities for marginalized people to speak and bring much needed attention to the issues they face. At its worst, social media also offers 'everyone' an unprecedented opportunity to share in collective outrage without reflection.

The first amendment makes it clear that we are free to practice religion without government interference. The Constitution also establishes the separation of church and state so that the laws we live by our never guided by religious zeal.

Pink is my favourite colour. I used to say my favourite colour was black to be cool, but it is pink - all shades of pink. If I have an accessory, it is probably pink.

I love, but I am not entirely sure how to be loved: how to be seen and known for the utterly flawed woman I am. It demands surrender. It demands acknowledging that I am not perfect, but perhaps I deserve affection anyway.

Maybe true love isn't out there for me, but I can sublimate my loneliness with the notion that true love is out there for someone.

Demands for solidarity can quickly turn into demands for groupthink, making it difficult to express nuance.

We bear witness to the worst of human brutality, retweet what we have witnessed, and then we move on to the next atrocity. There is always more atrocity.

I recognize that I'm human, and the older I get, the more I realize how fallible I am, how fallible we all are.

As I started to think about how I can claim feminism while also acknowledging my humanity and my imperfections, 'bad feminism' simply seemed like the best answer.

Internet outrage can seem mindless, but it rarely is. To make that assumption is dismissive. There's something beneath the outrage - an unwillingness to be silent in the face of ignorance, hatred or injustice. Outrage may not always be productive, but it is far better than silence.

I try to understand faith and religion. I was raised by wonderful Catholic parents who were deeply faithful and taught us that God is a God of love.

I'm sick of hearing, thinking and talking about Woody Allen. Nonetheless, the allegations against him continue to capture our national attention because so much of the story is strange and sordid.

You can't control the fact that you are born a white man or born into wealth. When people say, 'Check your privilege,' they're saying, 'Acknowledge how these factors helped you move through life.' They're not saying apologize for it.

It would be easy to assume that the open letter is a symptom of the Internet age. Such is not the case. In 1774, Benjamin Franklin wrote an open letter to the prime minister of Great Britain, Lord North - a satirical call for the imposition of martial law in the colonies.

I don't want the whole of my writing or my intellectual energy given over to race because I have diverse interests.

We have cellphones and smartphones and iDevices and laptops and the ability to be perpetually connected. We never have to miss anything, significant or insignificant.

I read too many romance novels during my formative years. I have a penchant for romantic comedies. I understand why 'Romeo and Juliet' came to such a pass.