I'm not aiming to be someone like Christina Aguilera.
I try not to think too much about where my voice comes from. I'm channeling characters and emotion to come up with beautiful words that tell a story.
Being a black sheep is a way I would describe myself.
I got down to business and started writing furiously. I wore my fingers down to a callous state writing with every Tom, Dick and Harry around the world, including a chap named Charlie who plays for a man named Bob, to wrestle my emotions and bring out the raw grit hiding in my tightly guarded sub-conscious.
I'm getting all domesticated. I feel like Susie the homemaker.
I was in a band in Auckland, and I remember they all hated me. They had a big intervention. They said, basically, 'Gin, we think you suck.' I was miserable. I cried and cried. But looking back, that taught me about social skills and how to communicate with musicians.
I'd say the key thing is to remain true to what originally got you into music. When I wrote 'Hallelujah,' it ignited me to do music because of the love and joy that I got from writing that song. Down the road, you get all of these opinions from people; just remember what got you started in the first place.
I listened to John Denver and Simon & Garfunkel. Edith Piaf was a huge favourite. Then I discovered musicals - I loved 'Les Miserables' - and, at about 14, I started listening to David Gray.
I think I was probably a cowboy in a past life.
I love the energy in the U.S., you know. Everyone is really psyched. You feel really privileged to be there.
You can't go round looking like a rag.
I've got a very short attention span, and this has been part of the reason I'm so kind of dumbfounded at the fact that I've still stayed with music. Nothing has ever stuck for me, and music's the only thing that's managed to stick out for a long period of time.
Writing music is such a freeing exercise, and it's really nice to play in that world of being confident, vengeful - getting back at all the bad boyfriends.
