That's the trouble with directors. Always biting the hand that lays the golden egg.
But I don't have a very good track record with royalty. My dress fell off in front of Prince Charles at the Prince's Trust, so I'm just living up to my reputation.
I don’t know you, And you don’t know me. It is this that brings us together.
I split it up into working on the two narrative pieces that can tell a story. The scariest thing was whether I'd be any good performing live again. It was such a long time since I'd done any live work. It's so different for me than recording. Every night my audiences were what I would dream of. You could just feel their support.
The thing with 50 Words of Snow is that it was literally back-to-back from Director's Cut [also released in 2011]. It was more or less that I got to make two albums in one hit. I was already in this space in my mind to be writing and making an album.
It wasn't that we were afraid of the Church or the Vatican. The record company thought people might find the title offensive. They asked me if I would change ["A Deal with God"].
They were worried we wouldn't get any radio play at all[ for "A Deal with God" ]. That's why it was changed [to "Running Up That Hill"].
How are we going to know what impact that has on the greenhouse gas emissions? How are we going to hold everybody accountable for doing their part?
There is the first satisfaction of arranging it on a bit of paper; after many, many false tries, false moves, finally you have the sentence you recognize as the one you are looking for.
Each new book is a tremendous challenge.
How dare we be pessimistic? Maybe the future is better than it used to be.