A Quote by Tove Styrke
I needed to get to know myself and really, really explore music without any pressure to sell it. I wanted to try and not restrain myself at all, so I've been trying to move quite freely between different sounds and genres.
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I wasn't really actively trying to pursue music, so I was really just allowed to create freely without any pressure or outside influences like, 'Oh, I should be making this' or 'I should be collaborating with this person.' It was just kind of like whatever I wanted to do. I was just having fun with it.
I moved to Europe and was able to take time and really explore who I was and who I wanted to be. I needed that time for myself to really do that self-exploration and get back in touch with my roots.
For me, something that's been always really important to me, that's also really served me well in hindsight, is doing different things, trying to cross different genres, and dipping my toes into comedy and drama and action here and there. Fortunately, as I've been working, the industry has also changed where you're able to dip your toes into different mediums, where it's not just independent film and studio film, but now you've got TV, and you're able to do all these different things. For me, it's just a matter of continually pushing myself and challenging myself.
With regards to the paint, I'm normally quite introverted and shy. I keep myself to myself, and I find that when I hide behind the paint, so to speak, I'm able to let myself go more and move more freely than I can without it.
I was one of those kids who kept trying on different skins in high school. I was very afraid to be myself around all of these kids, to really reveal any part of myself that was true, so I would try on different skins, try on different masks, hoping I'd hit on one that was cool or quirky or interesting enough that suddenly I would be OK.
The relationship between art and a job is not quite linear, but I really love any and all manifestations of art, really respect any kind of artistic impulse, whether it's paintings and sculptures or really good filmmaking or music. I really see the relationships between these different mediums as very fluid.
I hadn't known anything else, other than being an artist, and I needed to be a person for a while, really get to know myself without that whole thing [of selling music] surrounding me.
A lot of mantras that I use in my daily life to get through - to move through the world in peace and harmony with myself - find their way into the music that I make. Many of the lines that people seem to be drawn to in my music really come from these mantras that I repeat to myself to try and move through the world in more thoughtful, comfortable way.
I auditioned for 'The Voice' because I really wanted to try and figure out a way to get myself out there. I really couldn't imagine doing anything else - music was the only thing that I really clung to.
I used to be the guy who wanted to do everything myself, wanted to write and play everything myself, but the older I've gotten, the more collaborations I've gotten. I really enjoy working with other people to create different styles of music, because I really do listen to everything, and I enjoy every kind of music. I think some of the best stuff comes from working with people who have different perspectives on the same thing.
I love music. I love every kind of extreme sort of music, and many different genres, and if I were to have to dedicate myself to just one kind of genre, I would feel kind of gypped. I'd be like, man, I wish I could do this or that. And really all it takes is trying it out.
I needed targets, different things to go for on a daily basis—a distance on the treadmill or a weight goal. Without them, I wasn't celebrating myself enough, and I got really good at beating myself up.
At 16 I was living in the Congo, and, you know, it's your teenage time. I really wanted to find a way to express myself, so I started to write songs in the Congo, and I think that's why my music is quite open, with a lot of different influences.
That's the nature of representation; every time we represent something we alter it and slightly change it. And so with that as my foundation, understanding that it's always fictional to some degree, I give myself a certain freedom to really explore and ask myself questions. What might not have been understood at that time? What might have been hidden at that time? What narrative in this particular image wasn't the primary image, but is really important? That is really interesting to me, and then I try to tease that out as much as I can.
I always have sort of been someone who has contradictory parts, and I haven't tried to uncomplicate myself. I've sort of let things seem contradictory, and sometimes it really confuses people. I don't know if it's working all the time, but I'd rather do that than try to sell myself as one thing or another.
There are definitely things about acting that have helped me growing up and finding myself, but there are also things that make it a bit more difficult. I guess I do allow myself to explore more when I know that, at the end of the day, if I really wanted to, I could just play a different person all day and be fine with that.
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