“That’s the thing about awards – it’s for the people who do all the hard work behind the scenes. An award is just a clap at them.”
― Sia
“When you have a lot of people telling you what you are and perceiving you in a certain way, it’s difficult to find your own identity.”
― Sia
“I’m sensitive and get easily upset and insulted.”
― Sia
“My goal is to give girls and boys a different idea of expression. It’s not always about looking pretty or cute. It’s about expressing yourself however that may be, even if that’s being silly or goofy or weird.”
― Sia
“If anyone besides famous people knew what it was like to be a famous person, they would never want to be famous.”
― Sia
“We all need to stand together and be a part of creating the future we hope to see.”
― Sia
“There’s this image of us on the red carpet, being really fancy, and then there’s the reality.”
― Sia
“The truth is that you shouldn’t match your insides to other people’s outsides. Life is an inside job, and we just have to do our best.”
― Sia
“I love to dance. I have always been the first on the dance floor, but I’m not teachable. I couldn’t learn ‘five, six, seven, eight’ if my life depended on it.”
― Sia
“I was pretty much tap dancing for attention from a very early age.”
― Sia
“As a person, I’m a good person who shows up for my friends. I do my best to be good. As an artist, I have no idea.”
― Sia
“About 50 percent of the songs on the radio are like, ‘Live like tomorrow doesn’t exist. Like it’s my birthday. Like it’s the last day of my life’… Such a large percentage of pop music is really about party time.”
― Sia
“I’m not selling a dream; I’m not selling fame like it is some sort of fantastic thing.”
― Sia
“I just wanted to have a private life.”
― Sia
“I don’t care what people think of me, unless they think I’m mean or something, but I don’t care if they think I’m like someone else because I know I’m not – I’m a total weirdo. I’m not selling a dream; I’m not selling fame like it is some sort of fantastic thing. I’m just trying to sell music and get on with my real life.”
― Sia
“I was weirdly obsessed with music until I was 11, and then I turned into a nerd.”
― Sia
“Life is pretty surreal and awesome.”
― Sia
“The weirder the better for me.”
― Sia
“When you’re in a different place every day, there’s this kind of madness that sets in.”
― Sia
“I’m impressionable, that’s for sure.”
― Sia
“I can clear my mind, and lyrics just come out; it’s very easy for me.”
― Sia
“I’m an advocate of ‘it’s not what you are, it’s who you are.’”
― Sia
“When I’m in a songwriting phase, it’s a phase. I don’t just suddenly feel inspired and then write a song, because I always write with a co-writer.”
― Sia
“I have never made money selling records. I have never really made money touring, either, or with merchandise, surprisingly. But I do make money by just having my songs in the background of television shows or in commercials or movie trailers. That’s been really good.”
― Sia
“I don’t know anything about the history of music.”
― Sia
“I was a slightly overweight, spiky-fringed, rat’s-tailed ’80s girl who was just showing up. That’s all I’ve ever really done to get here, just kept showing up. Even when I didn’t want to. That’s what I do.”
― Sia
“I don’t need to sing in front of thousands, as I can sing in the shower.”
― Sia
“I thought I was going to be an actor. I liked entertaining. I was pretty much tap dancing for attention from a very early age. My family was kind of musical, and there were people in the circus next door and actors across the road. I just enjoyed messing around with music growing up, but I really thought I was going to be an actor.”
― Sia
“I don’t want to be followed by paparazzi; that terrifies me.”
― Sia
“People call me for the ballads. Apparently that’s where I’ve been pigeonholed. But it’s really interesting and really fun. It’s my favourite part of the job, writing.”
― Sia
“I love watching reality TV, but being part of making it was just demoralizing.”
― Sia
“I don’t read reviews or interviews or anything, just because I’m afraid; If I believed the good, then I’d believe the bad, and there will be bad.”
― Sia
“Everybody in the entertainment industry is insecure.”
― Sia
“Melody is pure intuition. I don’t use any thinking brain when I do that. That’s totally in the zone.”
― Sia
“If Amy Winehouse was a beehive, then I guess I’m a blonde bob.”
― Sia
“All I really want to do is things I haven’t done. ‘I’m gonna put a paper bag on my head and be on the cover of ‘Billboard,’ see what I can get away with – if they’ll let me.’ And they let me. And I am literally giggling inside for, like, a month that I got away with it.”
― Sia
“Just, whenever you can, get up and sing at a gig or jam. If you have a chance, take it and keep on getting up. Keep going – but not If people boo, ’cause that’s just mean. I think that could be setting yourself for disappointment.”
― Sia
“I don’t really even go out that much now, except to walk my dogs, because I don’t want to be recognised. I used to be a really friendly person, and now I just want to be invisible. I liked myself much more before I got famous. I was much friendlier and had more energy.”
― Sia
“I think it would be very difficult to maintain one kind of art or whatever for your whole life. I think it’s unrealistic.”
― Sia
“Knowing now what goes into making a successful artist, it’s disheartening.”
― Sia
“I used to be addicted to ‘Reader’s Digest’ growing up. I would read the stories about love, and I guess that’s where I became a hopeless romantic. I draw from that a lot.”
― Sia
“I have so much to thank reality TV for.”
― Sia
“I hope I am a psychotherapist’s dream. I’ve spent enough hours in therapy.”
― Sia
“I’m a fan of the Strokes, so my big fantasy was that one day I would get to sing with them.”
― Sia
“I love visual gags and gimmicks; I love them.”
― Sia
“I don’t need to be rich anymore; I don’t need to be a millionaire.”
― Sia
“I’m just completely obsessed with Die Antwoord.”
― Sia
“I liked myself much more before I got famous. I was much friendlier and had more energy.”
― Sia
“I’m really visually stimulated more than anything. I don’t really listen to music. I’m more into watching telly or watching movies and visual art.”
― Sia
“When you’re entertaining all day long and that’s your work, you end up really very tired. You don’t have a lot of energy left over for your loved ones.”
― Sia
“Fame made me develop a panic disorder.”
― Sia
“I’m sort of a gay man trapped in a woman’s body when it comes to music sometimes – it’s crowded in here!”
― Sia
“I’ll be the songwriter for pop stars and then they can be the front person and I don’t have to be famous.”
― Sia
“When I was 10, my parents really valued success in the arts, and I thought if I was a famous ‘something artistic,’ that they would love me more.”
― Sia
“I don’t go to shows because I just want to listen to the music performed live. I want to get to know the person who’s performing it. Or I want to, like, take away a sense that I had an experience that nobody else is going to have again, or a unique experience for that moment.”
― Sia
“Like when I’m singing live I can’t hear myself. I’m just listening to the rest of the band. To listen to my voice, it doesn’t even feel like it’s me.”
― Sia
“A lot of people come up to me expecting to meet the person they have seen perform. It’s not going to happen, unless my mania, my stage person, responds to them and not the real me.”
― Sia
“There are probably five songs in the world that I get excited about when I hear them on the radio.”
― Sia
“I have social anxiety. It’s easier up on stage because there’s security in being there. When I’m off stage I’m trying not to be a manic freak. I’m quite shy.”
― Sia
“People aren’t honest about the horrors of fame. The downsides are so overwhelming that, for me, there is no payoff.”
― Sia
“I don’t want to be critiqued about the way that I look on the Internet.”
― Sia
“I’m allowed to maintain some modicum of privacy. But also, I would like not to be picked apart or for people to observe when I put on 10 pounds or take off 10 pounds, or I have a hair extension out of place, or my fake tan is botched.”
― Sia
“I think I managed to trick people a little bit into thinking I’m more arty by making creative, artistic, visual work and applying it to commercial music. Maybe. I don’t know.”
― Sia
“Probably from, like, 10 to 14 or 15, I would just listen to pop radio.”
― Sia
“I’m very easily influenced, and I’m also a quick study, so I think when I decided I wanted to write pop songs, I literally just listened to pop radio for six months to get a feel for it and understand it.”
― Sia
“’One Million Bullets’ is my baby.”
― Sia
“That’s why ‘Chandelier’ was interesting to me… I wrote the song because there’s so many party-girl anthems in pop. And I thought it’d be interesting to do a different take on that.”
― Sia
“’Chandelier’ took, like, four minutes to write the chords, then, like, 12-15 minutes to write the lyrics. Probably 10 or 15 minutes to cut the vocals.”
― Sia
“The ‘victim to victory’ theory is that, if you listen to the radio, a large percentage of the hits are… about victim to victory, like, ‘I’m having a terrible time.’ And then the pre-chorus is, ‘I don’t know what’s gonna happen next.’ And the chorus is, ‘Now I’m brilliant, and everything is great, because something happened to make it great.’”
― Sia
“I don’t do sessions for myself ever. I’m always working, writing for pop sessions. And what happens is that sometimes I like a song so much, I keep it for myself.”
― Sia
“Sometimes, after I finish the lyrics and have all the melodies and harmonies and the pop and vocal, I’ll be like, ‘I have to keep it. I love it too much.’”
― Sia
“I really felt like ‘Chandelier’ was a big pop song. But we weren’t sure what would happen if I wasn’t willing to show my face and do promo and go on tour and do the traditional kind of pop strategy. So I had no expectations.”
― Sia
“I’m just trying to work out a way to be a singer and to create cool content. I’m willing to do that as an entertainer. But I’m not willing to give up my actual self.”
― Sia
“It can be difficult navigating the line between tabloid gossip and authenticity.”
― Sia
“I love the idea of how fast can we make the song, but I don’t think that I’m necessarily, like, a super-talented songwriter. I think I’m just really productive. One out of 10 songs is a hit.”
― Sia
“So where a lot of people will spend three weeks on one song, I will write 10 in three weeks. Maybe the song that they sculpt is going to be as successful as just one of the 10 that I wrote.”
― Sia
“I don’t really listen to music. I don’t. I watch television.”
― Sia
“The melody will tell me what the song should be about, the tone of the song. That’s when the intellect comes in. Because I have a list of possible titles and concepts, and I expand on that.”
― Sia
“When I was 21, I went to London and lived there for eight years.”
― Sia
“Married life is awesome.”
― Sia
“I love hip hop, and I have a bunch of urban songs I write for fun that I can’t put on my albums because people would laugh and point.”
― Sia
“I had hundreds of thousands of dollars of tax penalties.”
― Sia
“I toured for 13 years, and it was very lonely, and it was hard work.”
― Sia
“I’m trying to have some control over my image.”
― Sia
“I’ve been writing pop songs for pop stars for a couple years and see what their lives are like, and that’s just not something I want.”
― Sia
“I get to do what I love and communicate whatever I want.”
― Sia
“The songs that work best are broad lyrically and have one strong concept in the metaphor.”
― Sia
“In my sobriety, I have discovered that the people I love, and who hurt me, were sick like me.”
― Sia
“I think that the stuff I write for pop music is terribly, terribly cheesy.”
― Sia
“I believe that once I put music out, it’s owned by the listener.”
― Sia
“When I’m writing a pop song, I’ll just write formulaically, strategically.”
― Sia
“I love TV, and I love movies, and I pull so much content from the drama in all of those mediums and put them into songs.”
― Sia
“When I write promotionally, I guess I give away the ones I’m less connected to.”
― Sia
“I’m acting a lot when I’m writing for other people.”
― Sia
“I appreciate my music is famous, but I’d rather my face wasn’t so that I can just live a normal life.”
― Sia
“I have a family I love. They tend to say, ‘Great job!’ Or ‘You work really hard! Good for you!’ Or ‘You look nice today!’ Or ‘Don’t be ridiculous, order the fries!’ Or ‘You are hilarious.’ That’s all the family I need.”
― Sia
“I guess I don’t know if I’m comfortable with fame or touring or promo or any of that stuff, and I really discovered that I love working for people and co-writing and working under someone.”
― Sia
“I really don’t know anything about music.”
― Sia
“I think that it would be unwise of us not to believe that there is life outside of us, intelligent life. And so I do believe in aliens.”
― Sia
“I was really bored of making downtempo albums.”
― Sia
“The accolades don’t nourish me – being with loved ones and my dogs does.”
― Sia
“I like to sing, and I like to make records – and that part is fun.”
― Sia
“I don’t listen to the albums that I make, and I don’t listen to a lot of music as a whole.”
― Sia
“The hour and a half I’m on stage is my favourite part of the day when I’m on tour because the only part I really love is the interaction with the audience.”
― Sia
“When I was outed by Perez Hilton as bisexual, I suddenly started being asked personal questions, which was really difficult.”
― Sia
“I’d had a relationship with a woman when I was 20, but nobody cared then. As it came out at the same time as my fame, I started to have panic attacks.”
― Sia
“I got a little bit famous. I didn’t like it.”
― Sia
“I’m just a follower.”
― Sia
“I started dating JD Samson from Le Tigre, and suddenly I was listening to more up-tempo music and old dance music, like ESG and Gang of Four, and I thought, ‘Wow. This is fun.’”
― Sia
“My dad is an egomaniac.”
― Sia
“I don’t really leave the house.”
― Sia
“If a transporter could send me from the bed with the dogs watching crappy TV to the stage five minutes before I go on, then immediately back to bed, I would love it.”
― Sia
“I love the writing and performing, but everything in between sucks.”
― Sia
“I don’t really identify as gay; I don’t really know what I am.”
― Sia
“I think it’s impossible not to see something you wanted happen to someone else and maybe wish it for yourself.”
― Sia
“I do not love performing. I get really scared.”
― Sia
“I like the Carpenters and Elvis.”
― Sia
“I just want to be a good storyteller.”
― Sia
“You never know what I’m gonna do.”
― Sia
“This is a sick business. It’s so sad.”
― Sia
“I don’t need security detail; I don’t need anything special. I just walk around, and I can do that, and that’s a real luxury when you’re in my industry.”
― Sia
“My dad and mom were in bands: the Soda Jerks, Fat Time, Girls at Play – which is a play on Men at Work.”
― Sia
“I liked Olivia Newton-John.”
― Sia
“I have big dreams. I want to keep songwriting. Direct films. Be a parent.”
― Sia
“I was too embarrassed to tell anyone I wanted to make a movie because I thought it would be seen as a vanity project because I was a singer.”
― Sia
“I can’t be bothered to learn Final Draft. I’m not a technical person. Like, when I sing, I just want to sing the melody and write the lyrics.”
― Sia
“I don’t want to have to do production, which is very technical. I don’t enjoy that.”
― Sia
“What I do enjoy is the creative process.”
― Sia
“’Titanium’ wasn’t supposed to be me singing, but they put my demo vocal back on.”
― Sia
“I refrain from blaming anything on my parents.”
― Sia
“I’m never going to sing the words, ‘I want to shut down the club,’ never, ever.”
― Sia
“Usually, the song will tell me who it belongs to. It seems clear to me who would do a good job with it, who it suits.”
― Sia
“I really feel like I’ve nailed songwriting. It’s my specialty; it’s what I’m good at.”
― Sia
“I’m fine around other people’s feelings. It doesn’t make me nervous or anxious.”
― Sia
“I get to sit at home with the dogs on the sofa, record in a closet in the office, send them off and, if I’m lucky, make a million dollars.”
― Sia
“I don’t care about commercial success. I get to do what I love and communicate whatever I want.”
― Sia
“I don’t want to be famous or recognizable. I don’t want to be critiqued about the way that I look on the Internet… I’ve been writing pop songs for pop stars for a couple years and see what their lives are like, and that’s just not something I want.”
― Sia
“A lot of the time, I don’t actually relate to what I’m writing about in pop songs.”
― Sia
“Fame is the worst thing that can happen to a person. I choose not to appear in anything publicly. Twitter’s it!”
― Sia
“I really don’t know anything about music. I don’t really listen to it. I don’t know anything about the history of music.”
― Sia
“It takes me, like, half an hour to write the lyrics for a song. They just come out.”
― Sia
“That would really be my fantasy – maybe just do three shows a year and each year in a different city, just singing for the people who really want to see it, and then just write for other people. I do love to sing, but I’m just as happy singing in the bathtub, you know?”
― Sia
“I think that, to some degree, being irreverent is the only reason I continue to be successful.”
― Sia
“I try not to do too much self-analysis apart from when I’m actually paying $170 an hour for it. I try to keep it in the room.”
― Sia
Leave a Reply