Bjork: The Icelandic Superstar on Being a Child Prodigy, the Power of Nature, and Staying Creative

Key Takeaway

Create within constraints, then deliberately leave space for ideas to mature. Set a four-hour focused creative block today: begin with the raw signal—your melody, question, sketch, or instinct—before adding structure. Then step away rather than forcing a mediocre version to completion. Björk’s approach is to let the work synchronize with her environment, relationships, and current interests, selecting the ideas that still feel alive after time and shaping them with concentrated attention.

Episode Overview

Björk reflects on growing up immersed in music in Reykjavík, evolving from an introverted child singer into a boundary-crossing artist, and continually reinventing her sound. She explains how nature functions as a language for sound, why she starts with melody rather than beats, and how solitude, selective collaboration, physical routines, and unhurried time sustain her creativity.

Full Transcript

Transcript of Bjork: The Icelandic Superstar on Being a Child Prodigy, the Power of Nature, and Staying Creative from How I Built This. Auto-generated from episode audio; may contain minor errors.

from built-it Productions it's the great creators conversations about creativity with some of the most celebrated actors musicians and performers of our time I'm guy Roz and on the show today Bjork and how her otherworldly Melodies began to pour out of her at an early age in Iceland it was sort of a long way to walk to school and I I actually loved it and it was sort of my moment of singing top of my lungs and like sort of ecstasy moment in being and harmony with nature bjark is and I should probably address the elephant in the room here it's not pronounced Bjork it's bjerg so how do you describe someone like her she's one of the most gifted and radical public artists in the world she's made records that have topped the dance charts but also albums that aren't radio friendly that are challenging and require you The Listener to give it time and concentration she's created magical installations performed in costumes that seem like they were produced in another galaxy and has never stopped exploring the outer limits of her creativity no matter the medium bjerg says the sound comes first then the visual palette her latest record is called fasora from the Latin word for Digger the sound is deep and resonant and features six bass clarinets the visual metaphors for this album mushrooms and underground tree roots in this episode you'll hear how bjerg considers herself not surprisingly an introvert and how she learned to come out of her shell to perform for the world you'll learn why her work often references the natural world and it's not because she's a die-hard Back to Nature type and how starting with a concept whether it's orchids or mushrooms helps her find a coherent sound for each album and you'll go behind the scenes of bjark's collaborations and the different approaches she takes depending on the medium that's all coming up after this quick break bjark began studying music at a very early age and released her first record in 1977 when she was just 11 years old more than 40 years later she's still making music and her fans now span across at least two generations and one of them is my 13 year old son before we start I have a question for you for my my 13 year old son he asked me to ask you a question so I'm going to ask you this question he says hi Daddy here's what I want to say uh hi beer it's so cool to meet one of my favorite artists of all time he asks how does it feel to be such a big influence for so many of my favorite artists like I don't know some of these blady Death Grips sizza wouldn't be here today without your influence um anyway that was this question how does it feel to be an influence to so many other artists wow wow on so many levels uh very knowledgeable for that age um and I'm also of course very flattered that every time when my music becomes is kind of it's like crosses Generations that's always a very precious thing for a musician um yeah when it comes to influencing like the people that you named um I I guess I have some sort of a blind spot yeah for it myself um I think maybe the best way I could answer this is Maybe uh when I was his age or when I was a teenager in Iceland um we would have like 17 people would come to the sheriff my band uh at the time and and so I think from very early on I was very committed to be sort of in my little um Niche or branch on the music tree whatever it would be um and whatever it would take and I think there's pros and cons with that um I think the pros is that it's it it's kind of crosses genders and and also seems to me a little bit cross Generations right if you're a bit of a sort of eccentric nerd you will end up uh uh uniting with all the other eccentric nerds out there uh no matter what year they're born yeah but but I I I remember my favorite music like when I was maybe 14 or something and I discovered Kate Bush and by just accident one of her vinyls ended up in my arms which because there was nothing like that in Iceland then and no internet it was like many years since that album had come out so it was not in the zeitgeists of Kate bullsho the 80s and I just listened to it non-stop for months and I really remember that feeling like like I I didn't need it to be part of the year that I was listening to like and and I think I've always remembered that feeling when I'm making my music that I would rather want someone to discover an album of mine and some flea markets in 20 years and yeah get obsessed by it and out of the context of the year it was made in all the Zeitgeist or the fashion or the what was on the radio or whatever and just take it for what it is um so I think that's the only way I can answer your son's question but does that make sense yeah it does yeah yeah it is really interesting to see how people ReDiscover or discover you know music that that was made you know 10 20 30 years ago um I want to ask you about your earliest memory of Music I've read you describe going to the harbor with your grandfather and hearing the sounds of ships and and that was musical to you that might not actually be your earliest memory but maybe it is do you have an early memory of understanding music or musicality around you yes I may be one specific summary but great blessed that I was brought up in a home it has been a little bit distorted in the media like as a hippie commune right it actually wasn't it was more an apartment people shared downtown Reykjavik with you know five rooms or something and people are had normal jobs but yes they did have long hair and it was more about sort of the music tastes they had which was hippie you know um so uh there was a record player there and big speakers and there would be a queue always and people would be playing like Jimi Hendrix Johnny Mitchell Frank Zappa and my stepfather would be listening to stuff like cream and King Crimson and things like that and and it was just played loud the whole time and every time like a vinyl album was finishing there would be somebody would be standing by the record player waiting okay I'm next I want to play this next so there was kind of more music than talking so I just remember being brought up like be one of these people who was brought up in a home where there's always music quite loud so it becomes almost like a sculptural thing or a soundscape that you you feel more normal if there's musical out around you it it it it's more like natural for you than to have sofa and table and chairs you know so that's um that was from very early on I think from when I was like three years old or four I think I remember actually sitting on the floor in an apartment my mother rented and we've sort of gathered that I must have been Maybe four-year-old or something hmm and looking at the album holding it the sergeants peppers with the Beatles and thinking wow I don't like this like this is not I don't like this this is um uh and then hearing something else and thinking like wow I love this this is like being in a chocolate warm chocolate pudding melting all around me I love this I want to be here forever so so I think yeah does that answer your question yeah yeah yeah yeah you know there's I mean I don't know if this is um irritating for you or if if it's interesting to you but so much of your your life is um is has been recorded right because from a very early age you were singing and and much of that is you can see it you can hear you can see you reading a story at age five or six um on Icelandic television and singing the the Tina Charles song I love to love when you were 11 years old and it's remarkable to watch you over that time you know evolve into into who you are now when did you first understand that you had a voice that you could actually sing and use it well good question um I think when I because I would walk to school and it was sort of a long way to walk to school and I I actually loved it and it was sort of my moment of singing top of my lungs and like sort of ecstasy moment in being in harmony with nature and uh and I did that for like 10 years or something I I don't know it's hard to count it but I never ever thought that that was something I would share I know it doesn't make sense now but when you're a kid you're not thinking like that it's more intuitive it was an impulsive it's it's something it was like oh this is my secret you know this is what I do when I'm on my own and this is my cave and I love it and I never ever thought I would share it you know and then my mother put actually that Tina Charles recording I think it's actually I was like nine it was it was sort of a radio show my school tit it was like a talent show and everybody had to do something different um and uh but when I was 11 there was an album came out that my mother was part of um that she sort of did with with the her other sort of friends and they were very very kind to me and you know you got to give it to him because they're so good with children and education it's the best environment to be brought up in and so much time hours and hours to sit with me go through music go through lyrics you know teach me how to use a microphone everything and um and after that experience when the album came out I was very like adamant that this did not feel right to me this is the album that came out when you were 11 it's called I think it's called Bjork right and I thought I would never ever do a soul album like I was like I tried that don't like it I just want to be part of my generation you know do be do communal things with kids my age you know yeah so if we go back to your question what was uh the moment where I thought I would be singing for people I don't think there was one moment I think yeah I think sometimes I was an amazing school which was like a Montessori School and um which I loved um and we would go on trips and buses and uh I would kind of always end up being singing in the bus just on my own and and it wasn't like uh me standing up look at me it was more like I was sitting in the back just like humming you know so um so it was definitely something that people kind of asked of me and I would do and I would really enjoy doing but it wasn't like it was more sort of a soothing thing and calming thing my first instinct was to be a drummer I wanted to be a drummer hmm and when I started in like punk bands uh I the first band that was in I I was a drummer but nobody wanted to sing and I ended up singing so yeah it was more like that so sorry how many answers to that question I mean I think the it's interesting you talk about um your kind of reluctant to be in the front and kind of do solo work and I think all of your work has been collaborative even your your all of your solo records have been about finding interesting people to work with which I want to ask you about in a moment but it strikes me as as quite um remarkable because you're self-described introvert you know you you have described yourself as somebody who doesn't really like to be in the spotlight and out there and yet of course your whole life and career you've been in the spotlight and on stage and and early on when you were you know sort of singing in bands I think the the first band you really sang it was like I'm gonna mess up the pronunciation but copy tikaras which I think is a kind of a in English it's it's not a very nice thing um I think right yeah translation but um the but you were a um I mean you were you were out in front and and as as a self-described introvert so how did you kind of manage manage that well the first band I was in with the girls that was more I was the drummer and then I that was in one band with this girl uh to sort of multi-instrumental thing like very conceptual we were recording my grandfather snoring and then playing that and singing using it as a drum machine um I think it was called Jam 80 right that was a band no that was another one anyway okay that's what it was called um but yeah anyway so there were many little bands you know it was typical right of the for that age but I think the two bands came later like like you mentioned and also cook and also sugar cubes all these three bands I had a co-singer who was more the communicator who's more the MC who's more talking in the Micron between songs and I could be more the introvert I was more um being more like a musical instrument you know and I actually didn't use words for for a really long time I was singing more in my own sort of gibberish um introvert language that I then slowly over the period of 15 years I started finding words to First Icelandic and then English and then when I was 27 I was finally ready to release a solo album with with words all over the place so it was a long process for me very long process do you still feel that way that that I mean you know do you feel that you are inherently introverted or do you feel like it's something that you um that you would no longer describe yourself as well I think are entered yes um but I mean everybody on the planet are a mix of interest and extroverts so I think my extroversy is something that I learned uh that doesn't mean that I'm not sincere but um for example when I do interviews I have to drink like four cappuccinos and I'm sorry to inform you that I'm heavily Under the Influence at the moment of caffeine of caffeine me too me too that's great yeah we can we can join this moment together and then I will sort of retreat I have like an interview day and the next day I will sort of maybe just go for a walk on my own and sort of retreat back but but to be honest I think aren't we all a little bit like that you know um overall I think so but but um yeah but I don't know I'm very talkative with friends and family um the people that are closest to me uh if if you would be like in a room with a lot of people that I didn't know I would not be the one who goes on stage and does a speech that would that would be absolutely my idea of a nightmare so so yeah that's yeah that's sort of the spectrum that I'm on if that makes sense when we come back after this quick break talks about how she manages to reinvent herself on every album bringing in everything from Punk to Jazz to electronic music while also managing to keep her sound consistently recognizable stay with us I'm guy Roz and you're listening to the great creators oh do you spend sleepless nights worrying about being submerged in quicksand being attacked by an unrelenting swarm of killer bees or how you'd out swim an angry giant shark I'm Anthony attamanik and I'm here to tell you to stop worrying and let me an anxious and overly informed comedian be your guide to solving your most worrisome what-ifs Don't Panic a new comedy podcast from wondery leans into our most absurd anxieties and diffuses them with humor and actual advice for how to deal should you find yourself facing your fears you'll laugh learn and possibly sweat profusely enjoy Don't Panic on the onedry app or wherever you get your podcasts you can listen to Don't Panic early and AD free on wondering plus join wondry Plus in the Wonder app or on Apple podcasts welcome back to the great creators I'm guy Roz bjerk's previous album was called Utopia and featured flutes and Airy synth sounds it was light and ethereal her latest album fasora is the opposite with lots of heavy beats and bass clarinets I and one of the things that you've you've talked about is reinvention and and you've even said you know you you have to redefine yourself every year because it's it's part of living I think you quote a Bob Dylan line which is uh if you're not being born you're you're dying or something the the messing up the line but explain to me this idea of reinvention because the I mean the the work that you do whether it's on this new new album that's that's about to be released or your earliest work they are so different all of the things that you do are so different they're bound I think by certain themes like nature um but they are very very different in their style in their Arrangements um tell me about this idea of reinvention and how you you assimilate that in into your life and work I I think overall it's like uh enjoyment feeling you get if you are being true to how you feel so in that sense it's sort of in a way selfish I guess um because um I think maybe with musicians too is you've got this kind of loop maybe we are lucky in that way you get like a loop of You release an open you tour it and you play every song 100 times you get bored with it you come home you're like okay I'm never gonna write a song like that ever again I'm gonna write now something that I can still sing it 100 times without getting bored with it it is quite helpful that model in sort of encouraging you to grow with it you know to throw off their the last sort of skeleton or like a it's like a transformation uh that you you go through um and and I welcome it um um I think in some ways I am very conservative obviously I always have to write with the same vocal cords and my sense of Harmony has been pretty consistent since since I was a teenager um what sort of chords I pick and stuff like that um uh so I do think it's more sort of the arrangement of the sort of environment I find myself in and I do try to learn from my mistakes emotionally and be someone who grows and becomes a better person so in that sense it has a trajectory of course but uh overall I I come back to the beginning of this answer which was at the end of the day is about what feels right and I think we all know that feeling you know when we go to dinner with our chosen favorite friends of that year and we all look at each other in the eye and get one drink and it's like yes like this is we we threw off some luggage and we are here together and it feels fresh and and there's you know nature rewards us right it gives us a good feeling when we did our homework and tried to grow and throw off old luggage that doesn't work and and then I don't necessarily mean throw off people because that's you know very often you need to go through all these Transformations with the same people and hopefully have a long-term relationship with them which I'm very blessed that a lot of my work relationships have been for years even decades yeah yeah so you know I've seen you perform many times going back to the mid 1990s and um what's remarkable about about your work is and your art is is as as I mentioned it's just the variety and the variability but the different kinds of things you do within them and across genres you know whether it's music art film dance even the costumes that you wear and the designs that you bring on stage it's a very very big question and sort of an abstract question and it's hard to answer but I wonder where where do where do ideas come from where do you find ideas where do you look for them hmm well I think because I worked a lot as a kid and like I told you before and was singing there I think all my work is still sort of based on these Melodies and these melodies are kind of the shape they are a bit eccentric shapes maybe because they come from me walking outside in Iceland in all different Weathers and they go all different directions you know they're free they're not tied down that's usually my starting point um and a lot of musicians that work with me for example people who make beats they um they're very surprised when we have to start from The Melodies and then I have a usually a team of Engineers that helped me map that out and putting like a grid to that programming upgrade to something that's free form afterwards which sometimes is actually a lot a lot of work um and then you have to put beats to that um a lot of electronic music the Beats come first yeah and and then people improvise on top of Beats I've done that for sure there are there are songs in my catalog that are like that but overall it's an exception and I tried to be truthful to the musical language or or shape that is information that is in the melody because usually there will be it's like throwing a murder mystery uh you see there is an emotion there there is an arrangement to be done and then the visual world it is also informed by the sound um and this is uh usually the sort of mood board that I give to my visual collaborators I like each album I will give them the same like for example on Utopia or on fosura I would give the sort of seven different visual people I work with photographers or film directors or animators they would get all the same references you know and there will be like sort of some visual mood board I would give them but that was always inspired by sound you know and in that sense it is maybe something that I've learned really slowly but over like a long long period of time is it's like some sort of attempt to do some sort of a synesthesia because for example the title for example of fosura was my new album is basically trying to describe the sound of it because it is full of bass clarinets it is a lot of it's very bottom end it's very bottom heavy so I use this word for Sora which means she who digs into the ground so it is describing an underground world and all the visuals sorry this is a bit of a spoiler will all happen in the ground with mushrooms and tree roots and bass clarinets and for example Utopia the album that was before that came out 2017 that was almost the opposite it was a city in the clouds 12 flutes uh it was almost no bass or bass drum in it it was all floating in the air so it's very Element air and that was very how I was feeling at that time it was sort of euphoric um ecstatic futuristic uh very idealistic like trying to create a paradise but it doesn't have the roots yet it's it's not grounded you know yeah and this album is in that way it's sort of the continuation of that it is where I take all the ideas on Utopia and give them roots and ground them and dig a hole in the ground and and kind of execute the ideals in real life you know with tables and chairs and cup of tea and friends yeah maybe a bowl of champagne and some jokes and and a couple of clarinets you you um you reference um the underground world and and mushrooms and and it's interesting because um you know mushrooms are underground networks right they're they're communicators it's how trees communicate to other trees through these underground mycelium forests and um and I'm not surprised that this record for Sora is about you know is sort of again it sort of comes from your relationship to Nature and the natural world and so much of of your work is connected to the natural world just I guess not just where you where you are now and where you grew up and what you see around you right I mean you you it's it's almost as if um you take cues from nature that you you're looking around and and it almost creates the art for you is that fair to say well this is an interesting question we could probably write a whole book on this subject matter I think for me it's normal you know like uh I think people who are put up in cities like our Urban for them like referring to buildings or or you know the Subway or or like libraries or train stations that's normal for them right for me because I was brought up in Iceland and I didn't really I went once uprut when I was you know 12 and the next time when I was 15 so I basically my first 15 years I was pretty much just here in Iceland and and it is the same like walking in nature it is just normal for me it's not Supernatural or or extraterrestrial or um but it also is not Back To Nature it's not like oh let's let's abandon civilization and let's all move back into caves that's never been my message or what I'm about I I would actually like to move forward to Nature and have our you know drawing machines and iPhones and Tech and solar powered and and wind energy and electric Carson but but we don't have to abandon nature we we can be in it and and experience The Best of Both Worlds um so for me it's hard to separate the two because it sort of is the same it's normal for me but I I do think though when I say okay this is my orchid album or this my mushroom album uh it is a shortcut I am actually describing a sound and when I call this right the fungus album it is basically I want people to listen to it really loudly and have in big speakers or headphones and it's very very bottom end kind of dingy kind of you know what musicians they would say to each other oh it's kind of like like roots or how top music is from Jamaica or something it's very bottom end sort of a mushroomy and musicians which they speak like that and they they get it you know so that's sort of what I'm trying it's actually meant to be a visual shortcut but probably sounds like something very exotic and sci-fi but in my strange brain musician Brain is meant to be some sort of like a visual shortcut actually describing the sound of it you um you made this record in Reykjavik you went back um I think during covet and spent um much of coven there um you've lived in New York and London and and but but it's spent a lot of time in Reykjavik um in the last I guess two three years um what what is it what has it been like for you to be back there um in you know for such a concentrated amount of time because for so long you were traveling or bouncing in and staying just for a few days or a few weeks and you know living elsewhere so what has it been like to to be back you know sort of both feet planted on the ground I I really like you know it felt amazing I haven't been so long in Iceland since I was 16 or something so I really loved it I mean during the periods I lived in London and New York I was still kind of 60 in Iceland um I never uh let go of Iceland I always had a home here too and spent majority of my time here but uh but you know I got all my boxes from you know New York and all of my belongings are now on this island which is very like satisfying I also just like the sort of Village Life of uh walking up the street and meeting friends that have been my friends since I was a teenager in the local cafe or the swimming pool grocery store and also just kind of the the Simplicity of you know being able to meet your friends for dinner without any planning or being very spontaneous or you want to go on a hike or get drunk downtown whatever you want to do uh you can just do it and um that was something that uh when both when you're living in a big city stuff like that can be quite uh like a lot of effort obviously I was I got I stroke lucky I was surrounded by all my friends and family in in the pandemic so I I am aware of how lucky I was it's a small Peninsula yeah surrounded by oceans so even though in the most extreme lockdown periods icelanders could always go for a walk by the ocean plus we had a nice cute little volcano um on our Horizon so it yeah it was it was a good life when we come back after a quick break bjark shares insights into how she works with collaborators it's very different depending on whether it's with other musicians or filmmakers or videographers or graphic designers stay with us I'm guy Roz and you're listening to the great creators hey welcome back to the great creators I'm guy Roz Bjork has cultivated a huge network of collaborators and that collaboration plays a really important part in how she's able to continually evolve as a creator I am curious about collaboration because I think that even even with the work you've done as a solo artist you've always sought out collaborators and it's kind of remarkable the different collaborators that you've worked with I mean David Attenborough or you know certain producers or artists I mean all of the art that you produce and create with collaborators has been really interesting and I wonder how you how you think about seeking out collaborators and people to work with because I think that is a big part of how you comp how you sort of build new artistic ideas um yeah I think more and more as I get older there's a longer time that passes uh I will complete the album more with the engineer uh that I'm working with at any given time and I will invite the guests later in um so it is uh what do you call it Solitaire Affair writing music which I love I love I'm I am a bit of a loner at heart and I love when you write music you're by yourself most of the time you know I will go either walking or I will work on my laptop or go to my cabin or work in my my apartment in town and then afterwards I will introduce guests um so I would say more and more I am sort of a little bit idiosyncratic in my my vision when it comes to the music but I think maybe in the visuals maybe a more collaborative there because uh I I obviously I don't look at myself as a visual artist I am more a collaborator when it comes to visuals so each video for example for this album has a team of um several people and we did it sort of together it was like a group uh effort thing and that actually reminds me more of you know when I was in band uh for 15 years which was a big chunk of my life where you sort of walk into the room and everybody throw a lot of ideas on the table and then you sort of it goes with what sticks you know like um and it's sort of like a democratic uh process and I really enjoy that it's kind of more selfless for me I'm less precious about that because maybe because I don't really have sort of a ambition as a visual artist but I think with the music it's the opposite I'm always very aware of uh how much little time we have you know if I'm lucky I've got 20 years you know of full energy and you sort of start to think okay damn I still haven't done this idea and that I didn't there's still like 10 ideas you haven't done yet so you you sort of have to kind of roll up your sleeves and get things done and make sure you document kind of what you got given in the most truthful way before you leave the planet so I do feel sort of a sense of obligation in that way to try to listen to what my DNA is uh because we're all very different so uh so I guess I'm always sort of on the hunt of of finding the circumstances and the environment where that sort of comes out of me more naturally with less will or ego or effort you know this question was about collaborations I I think it's also the one of these contradictions uh if you love yourself you can love somebody else if you're good at working on your own you're a good collaborator it's that sort of the Beehive um philosophy if you help yourself you know people will come and help you uh I do have a wonderful moment on on this album that are very collaborative with with both the hammerly's choir which is I'm very proud of it's nine different voices in one song it's probably the most complex choir arrangement I made um they rehearsed it for weeks and weeks and weeks they said it was one of the most difficult song they've ever sung partly because of covet it ended up being very collaborative album with the engineer Parker Thorson who also is a musician he also makes instruments and he is also classically trained and plays the trombone so uh and I was lucky enough that he was in my bubble what do you call it lockdown bubble was made that sacrifice with me and and there is also obviously there is Emily Nicholas and sapping with feet and then of course the six base clarinet players and then of course my children are both on this record my son and my daughter are both singing which felt very very natural and it felt like the right time in so many ways in so many levels you know um I I wonder about the the the number of things you've made you know whether it's art or or films or collaboration albums or your own records um is is too many to describe you seem to kind of hint at it but this idea that you have this inner urgency to make new things that it's part of your obligation I think was the word you used to to create art and is that what motivates you I mean you make so much you're making new things all the time and um seems like you you are working on things all of the time and does it come from the sense of urgency that you know that that time is limited that we're basically every day we're one day closer to the end I think actually I did allow myself on this album that's maybe why there's five years since the last one this one I actually had all the time in the world and I felt the present that I want to give to myself for all the hard work and all the sort of it was like okay here's an opportunity what do you want to give to yourself and I was like you know what I wanna give myself take the pressure off and just have all the time in the world so I was sometimes oh just two weeks just having dinner with friends going on hike maybe got an idea that was okay I was like I'm not gonna follow that one I'm just gonna wait and then two weeks later I would get an idea I thought was much better and then I would complete that so uh maybe earlier I would have you know I would have had a lot of other things on so when I got sort of an idea that maybe was sort of average I would I would finish it anyway and just try to make it good in the execution or something but um but I think with this one I really tried to sort of just give the part of me that is just willpower and sort of ego sort of work ethic part of me just I just asked it to go away and and just only if it came naturally I would do it and uh and I was very blessed because the engineer I worked with was living three minutes away from me so I could just text him so in that sense I did take the the sort of pressure off and and wanted maybe to document more sort of an effortless side in me and you know when I I don't have to live in two countries or live on airports or hotels that I could just be home and walk to the local shop and like go swimming and then walk back home and what what would happen if I did that for two three years and just what would just happen completely naturally so that album was wearing that for me how much of work that you do do you discard describe being you know working in solitude and working on on songs and arrangements and how much of what you write ends up never being made that you just feel isn't good enough hmm that's a good question um um I mean when you're writing something and you're working out a song or or Melody and you're reaching back to that time when you were a girl walking to school trying to hear those Melodies maybe how much of of something do you say no that's not right or maybe this will work and then you work on it and then you just toss it off you just throw it away um well I still walk so um my Melodies have changed so I do try to tap into the person I'm now like not it's not nostalgic to my childhood in that sense um um uh I actually overall what I can only compare myself to other musicians but people that I have worked with um and I've seen that they have sometimes dozens or even hundreds of songs they haven't used and definitely not one of those people I think um I'm more like if 14 songs end up on the album I kind of started out with 17 you know um and sometimes the sort of extra three or four songs were just arrangements or Melodies like I didn't like complete them I'd uh so um I think overall the way I work it's all about timing like if you don't include how you're feeling how your environment is how the people around you are the music you're listening to the music you're dancing to the books you're reading the the films you're watching like basically everything that's sort of in that sort of three year period you'll you'll end up paying the price later do you know what I mean um so I think very much what I do is about synchronizing all of these things so it's sort of about waiting for the stars to align and waiting and then suddenly wow like here I can three three things of my life of you know February 2020 have I lined up so I'm gonna document it I think it's sort of a holistic in that sense or it's more I think maybe it's sort of a quite a feminine way to work because it is not about creating thousand things it's more about where is the moment where I have four things here that need connection and I can connect them and a lot of my lyrics actually are weirdly sort of how do I find the flow you know something like that would be a typical me sentence because I am very focused on that like I'm trying to find the flow between the rhythms that I'm listening to at the moment or the friends I'm hanging out with and the people I love and what's happening in the world and talking about the environment and whatever and and suddenly you wake up one morning and you can feel that you can connect four out of six of those and that feels pretty good so it's more about the connections between them or the flow rather than the individual events if that makes any sense so when you work that way you actually end up with not that many ideas so you end up rather building the 14 things you have rather than making 50 ideas does that make sense yeah how important is it for you to have days or periods where you your your brain is not engaged because I think your brain is working a lot I think just because of the your the output of your career and and the variety and the different things that you've done and the you know the the artistic expression that you've put out into the world in order to create that work how important is it for you to just go through time periods of time where you are not using your brain where you're just allowing it to kind of go in in in in different directions and not do you do you need periods of time where you do nothing up absolutely I I think actually um a lot a lot of the time uh I'm I'm like that I think maybe when I do interviews people get a different side of me because because I kind of drink you know four cappuccinos and then I talk very fast and pretend I know everything and then the caffeine wears off and I I wake up like oh I actually don't know anything like um so usually I'm not this sort of moto mousy kind of sort of person um but I think also because obviously I tour a lot and then you are I think that's very much a celebration of the body because I'm like obviously a singer so I'm I'm more like an athlete or yeah it's about like eating the right things and and doing yoga and warming my voice up and I really love that part of my job and going on walks and just being really really really physical like my body is my instrument and and you just leave like the people I work with like my manager they cannot even write me emails when I'm touring because my brain is just at home like I don't even mix those two states if that makes sense um um so I think obviously writing music is more impulsive for me because I start from Melodies so that's more sort of instinct and and because I'm a singer it's obviously quite physical I think the moments where my brain comes into the picture is maybe more when I'm writing lyrics and I do try to start with lyrics like that they have impulsive connection to the song so I will have like stick words or guide words and then because it's not natural for me to write lyrics sometimes it literally takes I'll write like you know 40 pages of words and then I have to edit it down to one page to the lyric um it sometimes go through a really long Road um but that's because uh words is not my first like natural way of expressing myself but I do feel very strongly about which word should be in my song so I do go I do make the effort and I do um search sort of and I don't give up till I found the words I feel are the right ones um maybe also what you could maybe say a little bit is the brainy side of my work is my arrangements and I feel more and more you know when I'm making like a string Arrangement or a clarinet Arrangement um uh maybe I will write a song and that takes an hour to write the melody or like a very impulsive like quick thing and then maybe I will spend months on on working on the arrangement another way I can answer your question sorry how long answer this is um is I ever since I was a teenager or when I was in pants or or even now I've never been able to do like long hours uh when you know when I was in bands and they wanted to like work you know Jam or improvise into the night uh I could never ever do that I was always the sort of kind of girl and I still am that I kind of want to work from like uh you know noon till four or five in the daytime and and uh a rather um like um prepare well you know warm up my voice watch a lot of films have conversations with friends that are and then come and work for four hours um very intensively and then I will have a couple of days off I'd never work in evenings for example I'm never been able to do that and like after four or five o'clock uh my brain just turns off and I just become impulsive again and I just want to like meet hang out with friends or family or or watch films or listen to music or you know go on walks or do stuff like that yeah sorry for my long answer I think that's why you've been so prolific because you do you do limit the amount of time that you are focused on but when you are focused it's intensive and I do think that explains why you've been able to create so much work um I mean that's a long time um it's a cumulative uh I think five years between albums is uh and 14 songs um I don't think that's like definitely not workaholic um I I feel like overall I think more when when I fall into the Trap of working too much is because I do so many different things that's more complex for me because I I'm both present when my album is mixed and mastered and I'm I'm there when my videos are edited and I will look at all the versions of the photos and I will mix the life album and I will and I'll find the clothes and and so it's it's all the different things um that sometimes I I find it a little bit taxing that I have to put so many hearts on maybe sometimes in the same week or something but at the end of the day I do it all for the song and and I feel it's something that's worth it because I feel if you write a song and you sing it and you want to present it to the World the amount of effort you put to travel across the world in an airplane to sing it for someone or find the colors or the costume the fitted or or um photographs that suit it and I do think it's worth it so I yeah so there you go that singer actor and conceptual artist pierrek her latest album is called fasora to see the show notes for this episode and links to bjark's work check out thegreatcreators.com bjerg and you can check out all of our episodes at thegreatcreators.com hey it's guy and I hope you enjoyed this conversation for more like it don't forget to subscribe to the channel and for the audio version just open up your favorite podcast app search for the great creators and tap follow