I only get compared to women, which is crazy because often the women they compare me to... we just have a similar hairstyle. Whether it's Joni Mitchell or Florence and the Machine - our music doesn't always sound anything alike. But we just all have long hair.

It took me two years to write 'Fallingwater,' but it's one of my favorite pieces I've ever made, and it was worth waiting for.

I know some artists who write every day, and for a while, I felt really guilty that I didn't.

The reality is my career started with a song that wasn't finished and a video I didn't know was going on the Internet. It happened so out of my control.

The craziest thing is I didn't know I could sing like this - ever. My voice has changed, or I've grown into it, woken up.

I've never made R&B. I've never made gospel. I've never made hip-hop - I don't think I'm going to, but I just want to keep challenging myself.

I'm a private person. I am quiet.

What I love more than anything in the entire world is making music. It's what I studied in school.

When I'm joking around, I'll say I'm a pop star, because it's silly.

It's interesting because all I want to do is make music. I want to sit in my room, play the guitar, make beats, sing... And I have never made less music than when being a musician became my job.

For me, it's important to ask what are you making, and what's the public's relationship to that. And I say public relationship because I don't really care so much about any sort of reception.

Lyrically, I've always thought about albums as a record of a period of time.

Ask about music growing up, I'll tell you I grew up playing classical music, and I didn't grow up in a musical household.

Everybody thinks that touring is really glamourous, but I pretty much sit in a room all day. I have a sort of office where I do emails, and I go for a run, and then at the end of the night, I go to bed. It's not like some crazy party.

Ask me my influences, I always talk about Bjork and Beck because they're independent voices in the music industry.

That's why people come to live music, right? To see something go wrong, something human, something vulnerable.

I spend a lot of time reading and try to make sure that I can get a little bit of alone time every day.

You need music that is compelling and intellectual, but you also need music that just feels good and you can laugh about and dance to, and I think I'm trying to marry the two in some way.

Friends came on the road, came on tour, came in my music videos; I got in the studio with them. I'm a really loyal person, and I don't have a really large group of friends, but the people I hang out with I really, really care about, and they continue to be a part of my life.

I do play a lot of instruments. I started with the harp when I was young and then sort of moved to guitar and piano.

The thing about fans is you don't get to choose your own. But every time I meet a fan, I'm like, wow, we would totally be at the same house party.

When I write songs, it happens very quickly, sometimes 10 to 15 minutes, and I draw inspiration from everything.

I feel really held in being vulnerable. That's always been the kind of music that I've gravitated to as well, but to feel really supported by my audience in that is a real privilege.

I spent my whole life in Maryland, but I wanted to experience more - fighting to get to urban areas where there was culture.