St. Vincent’s Annie Clark Says Smart Things

Photo by David Greenwald

St. Vincent‘s Annie Clark on adding her voice to the creative chorus and the title of her latest album, Actor:

“It’s about just the general sense of feeling like a fraud. 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,” she told the New York Times. “You can’t apologize your way into people’s hearts. You have to go full force.”

Not that I’m putting out records on 4AD, but I’ve thought about this a lot myself — Annie lays out the issues nicely. Every musician should be so perceptive. Actor is equally intelligent and, conveniently, out this week — buy it and get a bonus track.

St. Vincent – “The Strangers”: mp3

Previously: Live: St. Vincent at the Hollywood Forever Cemetery, 4.06.09