“I’ve been asked whether I have a hobby, and have felt strangely offended that anyone would assume I have the time.”

Miyazaki movies were what I was raised on. I’ve watched them since I was very young, and I’ve been greatly shaped by them.

When I record, it’s this very precious and insular thing.

If I have a song where I hit some really high notes, I want to try to bring in equivalently low notes somewhere in there.

I’m Japanese, and I’m also white American, and neither camp wants me in their camp.

Whenever I’ve tried to ingratiate myself to an existing community, I tend to give too much, to become whatever it is they want me to be. It’s something I do automatically – I’ve learnt to immediately adapt.

I have this thing about being acknowledged and accepted by institutions.

I don’t think ‘bleak’ is a bad thing.

Things seem to take so much longer for me to do. I have to say things 10 times instead of once. I have to knock on 10 different doors instead of two. For everything.

I created this ‘ideal America.’ Finally I came to the U.S. and realised, ‘Oh, I don’t belong here, either.’

All I want to do at karaoke is sing Mariah Carey.

I have my privileges, but I do feel like at every turn there is such resistance.

I think my whole identity is formed around not knowing where I’m from. It might even be that I find comfort in that confusion.

When you’re doing something you’re not used to, you kind of realize that you’re still a kid: even though the whole world around you sees you as an adult and you’re expected to act like an adult, you still haven’t actually grown up.

It’s very tempting, when somebody says they like this about you, to want to do that over and over.

I would love for Rivers Cuomo to listen to my music and see what he thinks.

I think my real influences are out of my control, which are the things that entered my brain when I was a kid growing up.

Owe nothing to anyone, except to love one another.

Those who understand the gospel cannot possibly look down on anyone.

Did they look like anyone we know? For example a cross between pippi longstocking and the wicked witch of the west would obviously give us marcie millar

Anyone who knows me well must understand and be sympathetic to my genuine need to be my own greatest hero. It is not a flaw of character; it is a catastrophe.

You have a right to have a feather duster. If anyone breaks in, you can make sure they’re really clean as they’re robbing your house.

No matter what anybody says, we can’t have it all. Not if you are a woman. Not yet.

The point is not to convert anyone to our view, but rather to help people wake to their own view, their own sanity.

Anyone who reaches for great expression has to be careful of the ridiculous.