K. Flay

“I'm having this disbelief and dissatisfaction with an establishment that feels like it's moving backward, and I think there's a similar feeling with everyone of my age and in the world of music and artistic stuff. Art is an important way those feelings get expressed and help people process their feelings and opinions.”

“When I first started making music, I was all about wordplay and how fast I could rap, but over the years, I've really gained an appreciation for melody. What's cool is that when you're singing, you have to be concise, and when you're rapping, you have the opportunity to be really detailed with your lyrics.”

“My dad was a serious alcoholic, and ultimately, that's why he died. When you're a child of someone who struggled with things like that, you look for the common thread. Is there a pattern? Is there an inheritance of pathology in some way? That haunts me.”

“A friend of mine encouraged me to try rapping, so I started experimenting with it, writing verses, seeing if I could fit an extra word or syllable into each line without tripping myself up.”

“I was thinking about how we're so in touch with our image now. That conception of ourselves, in a very physical sense, can be oppressive. You find people wanting to be in dark places, not really see themselves, see themselves as a filtered image. A curated image.”

“Even the dark places are places. You're still somewhere.”

“I write songs as honestly as I can without worrying about genres or labels. Sometimes I sing, and sometimes I rap, and sometimes I do something in between. I jump around on stage and don't care too much about how I look. I try to be myself even though I'm still figuring myself out.”

“I think the key for any kind of artist - and this transcends music - is a certain degree of authenticity and sincerity.”

“I'm intrigued by people who are super adept at manipulating their own image. We all do it to a certain extent.”

“I've always had a duck personality. Calm above water, feet going crazy below.”

“'Life as a Dog' is when I really started to feel comfortable, like I had the due north on my compass.”

“As an independent artist, you control the means of production, which is the ultimate form of empowerment.”

“More than anything for me, making music is about taking nothing and making something.”

“I hope people describe my music as lyrically driven, cross genre. Kind of alternative, kind of indie, kind of rap, kind of everything.”

“When I was growing up, I wasn't in bands, and had really no intention of ever doing music. I went out to California for college, and kind of on a whim started making music really as a joke, and over the course of the next five years started playing a lot of shows, and music became this really integral part of my identity.”

“A constant goal of mine is to try to put myself back in the place when I wrote something - not just to perform it on a surface level, but to re-enter that headspace, that emotion. That's the point of a live show - for it to feel immediate and present and a little bit unpredictable.”

“My songs are a mix of my own weird raised-by-wolves perspective and civilization.”

“Remixes are so much fun. For me, it's like this great release of energy. I like producing stuff for myself, but I also enjoy making music that wouldn't really suit my own vibe.”

“When I first signed to RCA, I was sort of excited and shocked that it was happening. But over the next couple of years, it really started to feel like that game you play when you're a little kid - the one where you put your nose on a bat and then spin around and try to walk.”

“It's like there's this boldness that I have where I'm driven by something that I can't name.”