There's a book called 'You're Not a Stranger Here' by Adam Haslett - short stories, a lot of them are about mental illness and gay people - that classic combination. But they're really well-written, really powerful. It's pretty good.

I saw 'Predators.' That was pretty good, actually.

iTunes is my favorite record store.

I think people are surprised that I'm not - I think people come up to talk to me, and they think I'm going to be really morose. And I am, but I do that by myself - no one wants to see that. It's not really a phoniness; I just kind of keep it to myself. So I think people are surprised when they come up to talk to me and I hug them.

I've had people tell me that I should just be sad and not joke around on Twitter, but they don't understand that joking and being deeply sad are very close to each other. I'll have a horrible memory that I find hysterical one day, and the next day I'll cry about it.

One of the things that 'Too Bright' refers to is how there's a lot of times where I see things that I could change that could make me more contented, but I usually just don't make those changes because they seem new and scary. I just stay where I'm at, even if I'm miserable, because I'm familiar with it.

I don't know if I could write a pop song without at least a little touch of bite in it, and it's usually not a bite that most people would want to sing.

I like to have fun! And everything that's good for you is not fun, and that bores me.

I am fierce, yes, but I'm serious about music.

I have a strange, not very traditional voice - I'm not Adele.

If I'm not writing, I can download a newer album everybody's making a fuss about. But when I'm writing, I keep myself in my own zone - I worry about listening to new music that'll inform me too much. I'm the kind of person who goes to another country and starts speaking in an accent after three days.

I really never want to try to be cool.

I like Feist's music because it's really smart, but it's really free and soulful at the same time. Sometimes you only get one or the other.

I don't think I wrote my first song until I was 25. And then everything I wrote ended up becoming my first album. I put my music online, and from that, things just happened.

I do not work out regularly, but I do dance so much and jump around so much on stage, and I do it every day, so I feel like that's my exercise.

For me, piano is just where I started; I know where to go with it.

My mom is always asking why can't I make something nice? Because I'll make paintings, say, and they're just really bloody and angsty. So I wrote 'Dark Parts' because I wanted to write something nice for her.

I wanna be bad sometimes - I wanna rip everything apart, -but it comes on less and less. Doing all this music stuff is very good for it.

I originally thought I'd grow up to be a woman. I didn't question that when I was little.

Sometimes I'm not into being a human.

The first record I bought was the 'Edward Scissorhands' soundtrack. I remember being really obsessed with the movie, and all the campiness sort of went over my head because I was so little - it's the same with 'Hairspray.' But I would listen to that soundtrack a lot.

When I first started making music, I wrote the lyrics first, but now, because the music has got kind of wilder, I've flipped it.

Good catsuits should have multiple zippers; they'll have a top and a bottom one.

I'm personally not a very contact-y person; I just let my phone die and don't turn it on for a couple of days.

I went off at a person who threw a plastic thing at one of my shows once. After I shamed them, I realised it was a little lipstick and felt bad for days.

I got very serious about micro-piglets and what it would be like to own them.

He was my biggest crush when I was 12, and it's never really stopped. I was on BenAffleck.com a lot growing up. I don't know why.

I like Costco. They got me to be an executive member, so I'm, like, a business class member. Somehow, I'm going to end up saving money or something. The thing is, I don't moderate very well, so I buy things that are supposed to be for a family or last for a week, but they never do.

I feel like my shows have always been a place where people can wear and be and seem however they want, and it's a heartening event.

I'm always 20 minutes ahead of myself in my head. But being present - it's beautiful when it happens.

I was a bad student. My teachers gave up trying to teach me how to read music.

I wasn't a hoarder, but I was on my way. I went to thrift stores and never didn't buy something. A lot of cat figurines, needlepoint, afghans. Grandma stuff, I suppose.

I keep making the music I do because I feel very purposeful about making things that would be helpful or quell some loneliness in people. I really needed that when I listened to music growing up and even now, so I don't mind that sense of duty.

My kitchen witch hangs above the sink in my kitchen. Some people think it's specifically so that you don't burn food when you cook, but I like to think that it's warding off evil spirits and bad things in general.

I think it's fun to be superstitious. There's a drama in being superstitious. I'm like that in general. I have friends who don't believe in love or just think it's a chemical thing, and they don't believe in magic. I enjoy believing in all that stuff. It makes things seem more important than they are, like there's more to it.

Our house was cluttered with little charms, thoughtfully placed. There were all kinds of little things going on. Like, my mom made a lampshade out of a picture of our family, but if you look closely, there's a baby Jesus that she cut up and put just above all of us.

I was watching a movie called 'Perfume.' The book is really good, but the movie is really bad. My friend was making fun of it. He kept calling this obese guy a perfume genius. When I started putting my songs up on MySpace, I didn't know what was going to happen. I actually didn't put much thought into a name and just quickly used Perfume Genius.

I don't know if I am a role model, but I've had young kids write to me. I try to write songs that I wish I would have heard when I was younger. It's kind of strange to think of yourself as a role model. That wouldn't be a bad job.

I am a shy person.

I think all gay men are used to people saying no to them, to people not giving them choices.

Hymns have always sounded like sung spells to me. I never felt included in the magic of the God songs I heard growing up - I knew I was going to hell before anyone ever told me that I was. People found comfort in this all-knowing source, but I felt frightened and found out. I developed some weird and very dramatic complexes.

I saw this Facebook video of a boy, probably around seven, wearing a dress he had fashioned from a blanket, sashaying through his house while his mother applauded and cheered him on. He was so proud. It was such a beautiful thing but bittersweet because I knew his spirit would change soon: that he'd become self-aware and ashamed at some level.

I think people come to my music just to feel less lonely.

I don't think art matters as much as keeping people safe.

I've known that people were racist and misogynistic and homophobic since I was very little.

I feel kind of limited and locked into my body and brain - I'm not super into it all the time.

I'm fairly dramatic.

I'm just very self-conscious about the way I look. I really am embarrassed of it, because I wish I wasn't like that.

I've definitely met some people that cultivated a masculinity that they taught themselves. I don't know how they figured out how to do it, but I couldn't.

I have ended up on so many weird Men's Rights Twitter accounts filled with weird anime. I don't know. It's so bizarre to me that people can think that way, and so I feel like I can decode them or figure it out. But you can end up so grossed out.