“Lover, I don’t play to win but for the thrill until I’m spent.”
"The Strangers" - Live @ Great American Music Hall (27 February 2009) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JAX3P1ueR6w
Actor (2009)
Context: Lover, I don’t play to win but for the thrill until I’m spent.
Paint the black hole blacker. Paint the black hole blacker
"Friendly, and Just a Bit Creepy: St. Vincent Defies Categories" in The New York Times (7 May 2009) http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/07/arts/music/07vince.html?_r=1&ref=arts&pagewanted=all
Context: I think anyone who is creative or self-aware in any way, there’s like a humility to it, or I should say a humiliation to it. But there’s also a self-delusion — the provisional ego, as my uncle would call it. The self-delusion is the thing that makes you go, oh you know what, all the music that I’ve ever loved in the world, I want to be a part of that — hey, listen to what I have to say, it’s really important, it’s going to matter.”
You can’t apologize your way into people’s hearts... You have to go full force.
QRO Magazine interview (2007)
Context: I enjoyed, and I tried to soak up and learn everything as fast as I could from doing any kind of music. It's good to have a gig. If you're a musician, it's good to be working.
I love doing all of it, but Marry Me is my baby, St. Vincent is my child.
“All my old friends aren't so friendly
And all my old haunts are now haunting me.”
"Laughing with a Mouth of Blood"
Actor (2009)
Context: I traded my plot of land for a plane to anywhere
Oh where did you go.
And I can't see the future but I know it's watching me.
All my old friends aren't so friendly
And all my old haunts are now haunting me.
The Kate Bush Story (2014)
Context: You can hear one note of a Kate Bush song, or one note of her voice even, and know immediately what it is. And that is the biggest feat of any artist, especially when you consider, you know, all the roads that she's gone down.
QRO Magazine interview (2007)
Context: Some songs I wrote that night, and some songs took nine months to arrange, get how I positioned them. Some songs I wrote parts of when I was twelve, thirteen, fourteen, fifteen… Just putting it together, just finding the right place for it. So it's really been a long time coming.... I'm actually really restless, in the sense that I'd rather be always making something new. I'm really excited about making a second record. I've got a lot of things up my sleeve, I guess.
“For that to have come out of someone's brain, period, is a remarkable feat.”
On the song "Wuthering Heights"
The Kate Bush Story (2014)
Context: For that to have come out of someone's brain, period, is a remarkable feat. For that to have come out of someone's brain, at 17 years old — this incredible song, incredible song … there aren't that many amazing pop songs that have two or three key changes in them —‚ and I'm not talking about some modulations, I'm talking: "Okay, now we're in the key of Q." It's like WHAT?! But it's so brilliant, it's so memorable. I always karaoke that song — if I drink enough.
“We're sleeping underneath the bed to scare
The monsters out”
"The Bed"
Actor (2009)
Context: We're sleeping underneath the bed to scare
The monsters out
With our dear daddy's Smith and Wesson. We've got to teach them all a lesson.
“Please keep your victory
But give me little death.”
"The Apocalypse Song"
Marry Me (2007)
Context: All your praying moments amount to just one breath.
Please keep your victory
But give me little death.
“Marry me, John, I'll be so good to you —
You won't realize I'm gone”
"Marry Me"
Marry Me (2007)
Context: Marry me, John, I'll be so good to you —
You won't realize I'm gone,
You won't realize I'm gone.
“I think I love you I think I'm mad.”
"An Actor Out Of Work"
Actor (2009)
QRO Magazine interview (2007)
“Come, my love, the stage is waiting,
Be the one to save my saving grace.”
"Jesus Saves, I Spend"
Marry Me (2007)
“In a really great way, you simultaneously try to take up as little and as much space as possible.”
On working in the ensemble group The Polyphonic Spree.
QRO Magazine interview (2007)
On one of her compositions on the album Actor, in an interview for Billboard magazine (20 March 2009)
“I'm a wife in watercolors I can wash away what seventeen cold showers couldn't wash away.”
"Save Me from What I Want"
Actor (2009)