What I noticed about living by the sea when I moved to London was that it's really bad when you only have lots of other people to compare yourself to. I grew up relating to the land as well as other people.

It's very addictive having a hit.

My first memories of life were Californian.

I lived in L.A. for a year when I was four - my dad was doing a sabbatical at UCLA - so it always remained quite a familiar place.

The way I feel about how I look changes daily, but as I've got older, I feel more confident.

Well, I was a real late-comer to listen to music, actually, because my parents - first of all, my parents weren't big music fans. They didn't listen to music. We didn't really listen to stuff in the house.

Despite fashioning myself a very unconventional lifestyle with my music, I had ended up in a really conventional situation. I was also guilty of becoming a people-pleaser, which is absolutely exhausting and not a sustainable way of living. It can be so damaging to fall into that trap, especially in close relationships.

When I tried to get a record deal, only one label wanted me. The rest said 'oh, we've already got a girl with a guitar.' Can you imagine them ever saying that to a guy?

The topography of L.A. is fascinating.

When I went to university I survived on jacket potatoes and pasta for three years.

I've always loved the idea of 'Guilty Pleasures.'

It feels like your subconscious can be way ahead of you, as a songwriter. You can write a song that you think is about one thing and months later you're playing it and thinking, hang on, this is completely informing where I am now.

My maternal grandmother was Cantonese, so I'm a quarter Chinese and half Irish and a quarter Scottish and raised by English parents living in Scotland.

I was adopted. I was born in Edinburgh, and adopted when I was about two weeks old. And it's a good thing, I think, really, that back then, in '75 when I was born, you were really given a lot more information than you're given now when you're adopted. And you know, you can access that information when you're older.

When my divorce came through, it was like being let out of a cage because I hadn't been true to myself before; I was being something that was expected of me.

Life is about embracing the things that make you different, which is often an uncomfortable thing to do.

What was incredible about the Maldives was that the entire island we were on consisted of sand. There didn't seem to be any dirt. You could walk around for hours barefoot with your white trousers skimming the ground, and they'd still be pristine white.

There was an obvious display of blatant sexism when I couldn't get signed. They didn't say I was ugly. They didn't say that they didn't like the music. They said I was too old! At 26! So Badly Drawn Boy, Doves, Elbow, James Blunt - you can be a gnarly old beardy bloke with a bit of a paunch and that's all right?

Albums tend to dictate what they need. Every time I have made an album it sort of feels like it is decided for me how that album is going to sound; it is not really a cerebral decision where you sit down and decide that you are going to make an album that sounds like 'this.'

I would be happy to live in a world with no mirrors, but at the same time, it's great to look good on stage because you feel you're offering more than just the music.

Getting to know myself changed everything. It's the best thing I've ever done.

My parents' concern has been one of my greatest assets - I needed something to kick against. If they'd supported me every step of the way I might not have had enough fire in my belly to get where I have. Then I think: was this whole thing reverse psychology, did you really go to those lengths?

I work better under pressure. I was the local badminton champion when I was a kid, and there was another girl who used to thrash me for the five days leading up to the tournament and then I would just nail her to the floor in the competition.

I grew up thinking, 'You go to university, you get your degree, you get a job, you get married and then you have a family.' But when I got to the point in my life where I had all those things, and was looking to start a family, I was miserable. I realised I didn't want kids.