Thanks to Ken (from the c-box) for the link of this interview with PensEyeView which was done around September before Breathing Underwater was released in US. So I picked some few interesting parts from the interview. You can read the whole article by clicking here!
PEV – Tell me about your new album, it is a little bit of a departure from your first one. What were some of the major influences here?
MD – I was listening to a lot of music that had beat behind it like Aaliyah and Lauryn Hill and Musiq SoulChild and for me I absolutely loved Unfold and it was just the type of album that I wanted to make, but for the second album, I felt it was really necessary for me to grow and try something different. I thought phonically I could keep myself really open, I was hoping for a lusher production and more beats.
PEV – It seems like a lot of the meaning is similar in the two albums, but some of these tracks would work in a club, is that a scene that you would like to be involved in?
MD – Yeah, I have really grown up listening to everything from rap, rock, hip hop, pop, techno, country, I really listen to it all and I did not want to limit myself to just being the chick with the guitar for my whole career. So yeah, I wanted to see if I could make a great dance track or something that people could move to.
EV – You worked closely with Brian Kennedy on producing this album. He has worked with a lot of other big pop artists, what was it like working with him?
MD – It was amazing, he has really become a dear friend through this process. He was the first person, when I was starting the album, what really strikes me…he is an incredible musician, great writer, great producer…he is one of the best piano players that I have ever met and it was really fun to collaborate with a musician of that caliber and also to become friends with him is an added bonus.
PEV – You said that you “let down some of my walls” with this new album and it was really emotional. Tell me a little bit about that, what were you going through when you made this album?
MD – I was falling for someone and in the past, anytime I felt for someone, I would shut them down and say I am walking from this so I don’t get hurt . But during the making of Breathing Underwater, I felt like it was important to let go of some of that and let myself feel whether or not that was going to hurt me or if it was going to be the most wonderful feeling in the world, I wanted to feel all of those things. And, so I did, so I think that is why it comes through in the songs.
PEV – I saw some reports that you wanted to push the release of this album back until you could find a new manager that you could work with and I saw on your Twitter page this week that you just got a manager, how important is that to you?
MD – Oh, its so important, I have been without a manager now for almost a year and it was a learning experience and in some ways a warning because I had to learn to run everything and do it on my own and I had to learn as much as I could about the business and what it takes to actually release an album, not just the songs…the marketing and promotion and the label and everything, I had to sort of learn that and that is the stuff that a manager will usually take care of. At the same time, I don’t think that my album was ready to come out without a manager, without someone that could organize it and its not something I could do on my own. I finally found a manager while I was away in Asia and we’re working together and we are sticking to the release date of September 15, which is really soon, but I am relieved.
PEV – You were recently in Esquire in their “Funny joke from a beautiful woman feature” does that type of publicity ever bother you and do you consider yourself a sex symbol?
MD – OH NO, definitely not, that’s a definite no. But, the Esquire piece to me was very tasteful and I might swallow my words later on, but I can’t picture myself doing something like Maxim, there is nothing wrong with it, I just don’t know that it would fit me as an artist. But I think that sexy is great in my book as long as it is still classy and beautiful, at least for me. Raunchy might work for other people but I don’t know if it really fits my music.
