The world according to Marina

Originally published in NME, 20th February 2010 (my first feature for them!)

We already know she loves Hollywood and drinking shampain, but what really makes Marina Diamandis tick? Well, reincarnation, feminism and Dolly Parton, it seems…

In 2010, pop rules once more. This is a very good thing. But scrape back its Photoshop handsome veneer and you’ll find a personality-shaped void – Ellie Goulding wouldn’t say boo to a chaffinch, and don’t even get us started on Frankmusik. This, it goes without saying, is a rubbish thing. Pop without personality is like chips without salt. Pointless.

Thank heaven for Marina Diamandis, then; the infectious, cackle-powered tornado who’s the antidote to all this waftiness, a self-proclaimed “fucking wildcard” with the gumption to voice her opinions and flaws, as she does all over her 9/10 NME-scored romp of a debut, ‘The Family Jewels’. Come to think of it, she’s probably our favourite pop star since Lily Allen became more concerned with flogging Chanel than making us chortle.

Why? Because unlike so many of her peers, you actually care what Marina has to say about stuff. Like Biffy Clyro (“their music just smashes me in the face”), The Distilers (“my favourite band in the entire world probably… or Metric, I can’t think of one of their songs I don’t wish I’d written”), or the first gig she ever went to (“depending on how truthful I’m feeling, it’s either S Club 7 and Craig David in Wales, or The Spinto Band in London”). About how she worries people think she’s a hippy. Or how she can’t have a pet because she worries it’ll die when she’s on tour.

Because of all this, we thought it’d be a good thing to sit down and chew the fat with the 24-year old Greek/Welsh singer. Opinionated, articulate and funny – sometimes talking sense, sometimes talking utter bullshit – this is what she told us. Welcome to Marina’s world…

MARINA ON POLITICS

I’m voting for the Green Party at the next General Election. I don’t think it’s a wasted vote. I think you can believe in some of the stuff they’re saying, the environmental stuff particularly. Do I offset the carbon emissions from my tours? No, I fly private jet every single time! (Laughing) No, I think with touring you can only do so much as you’ve got to travel, but in my personal life, I try to only have stuff that I really love or need, I always recycle and try to not waste food – just these tiny things. I don’t know if they make a difference, but at least I don’t feel like I’m such a greedy, ignorant person.

MARINA ON THE ANCIENT GREEKS

I want to learn more about their philosophy because they were so ahead on so many things. It just blows my mind that a whole civilisation thousands of years ago could have been that advanced. I think the way that women were referred to was a little better than now. The goddess of wisdom was a woman! And also on an aesthetic level, I love the simplicity of the way that they dressed and did their hair. In terms of their theories of the afterlife, I actually really believe in reincarnation. I am very superstitious, and I think that everything is energy-based. I don’t believe in one religion per se, but I think that whatever you put out, you get back, and when you die an energy continues to exist, and you either go into another body or you float around for a while (laughing). I think I’ve been here lots of times before!

MARINA ON FEMINISM

I call myself a feminist. It’s a term we still need, and I say it because everyone else is so embarrassed to. Any woman who’s asked, ‘are you a feminist?’ they go ‘Oh god no! No, no, no, gross!’ Even to say ‘female empowerment’ makes me cringe, but it’s changed a lot – in the noughties, I think empowerment meant females being in control of their own sexuality, and everyone being very attracted to raunch culture. I think the situation that we’re in now is that there aren’t really any females who represent an alternative to that, and that’s what I’m interested in. It’s very hard because when I first started reading about feminism, I felt guilty for looking nice or being girly at all, and I think that’s such a negative thing – I am a girl, and everyone in the world wants to look good! I feel incredibly naïve talking about it though because I’ve read about four or five feminist books in my life, but I am very inspired by it and I do think about it a lot.

MARINA ON SAVING THE MUSIC INDUSTRY

Sometimes I’ll look at a promo schedule and think, ‘God, that’s really not sensible or needed.’ My idea is to scrap the method of basing the whole campaign around an album format because physical CDs don’t really sell any more, it’s either digital or singles. I was thinking of doing two thirds of the promotion that a normal artist does, and the third left over would be to continue writing and being an artist. I think it’s really important – this’ll sound really clichéd – to keep on being creative. If you don’t write for two years you’ll go back to it and it’ll be like a muscle you haven’t used for that long. I worry about that. A painter wouldn’t take two years off to tour.

MARINA ON her roots

If you don’t know where you’ve come from, then how can you know who you are? How can you not feel lost? With Greece, I still feel embarrassed because I still don’t know such a huge amount about my history and my culture. After this album, I’m going to move there to write my second one. I also feel that way about my Welsh side and British side – I’m just rubbish at history! I’m determined to learn more.

MARINA ON DOWNLOADING

I would like to see some kind of policing, but how are they going to do it? We definitely have to do something – I don’t know if the French Hadopi Law [illegal downloader’s have their internet access cut off after ‘three strikes’] is the right way, but I hope the government changes something. Obviously we’re not in dire straits, people do still buy music. I used to rip online but I started buying on iTunes – I just like the idea that my MP3 track is a little bit better quality! Psychologically it feels nicer to get a perfect album. A song’s a song, if you like it enough to listen to it then I think it’s fair to pay for it, especially if you can afford it. If you can’t, you can still go on YouTube or Spotify, it’s not like, (wags finger) ‘Poor you, you have no money, no music for you ever!’

MARINA ON DRUGS

I haven’t taken any kind of drug, ever. I think they’re rubbish. Never have, never will…

MARINA ON ‘HOLLYWOOD’

I’m obsessed with America, I’ve been there a lot now – this is partly what the video for ‘Hollywood’ is about, and a bit of the message in the song is how we all aspire to achieve some part of the American Dream. Yet a lot of the people who have achieved it are either not very content or their lives have ended in total tragedy, like Elvis, Marilyn Monroe, Michael Jackson. We’re led to believe that you’ll only be happy if you live that kind of lifestyle and strive for fame, but that’s often nonsense.

MARINA ON IMAGE

I think my image has changed a lot since I went onstage at Camp Bestival in my pyjamas! I think I was feeling a bit pissed off then [laughing] and I just didn’t care what anyone thought of me. The more videos and artwork I’ve done though, the more I feel that it’s important to maintain an image. It’s weird because I never thought that I’d feel like this, and I thought people who did were either insecure or just always needed to look great. But it just wouldn’t make sense to go on stage in pyjamas now! I’ve got loads of exciting things coming up for the tour – for the February one, I’ve teamed up with a designer, not to design my own line, but for her to basically design a line inspired by my ideas of cheerleaders, with sashes and stuff like that. She’s created eight pieces, which are incredible. And the stuff I’ve got planned for the May tour goes somewhere far beyond that still…

MARINA ON GLEE

I haven’t got into it, I don’t know why, I just can’t do it. I didn’t really give it a chance to be honest, I saw about 15 minutes of one episode and thought it was rubbish.

MARINA ON OASIS SPLITTING

I didn’t care and I still don’t. I didn’t listen to them when I was younger, I just didn’t see the point. The first album I bought was ‘Tragic Kingdom’ by No Doubt, and that was probably the last album I bought until ten years later! Except for perhaps Alisha’s Attic. I just liked the music my mum liked growing up… Dolly Parton, George Michael, Enya, Lauren Hill…

MARINA ON THE PITFALLS OF BLOGGING

It was my decision to delete my blog. I thought that about 100 people were reading it, but then Warners told me that it was more like 15,000! For some people, especially journalists, it’s like a goldmine of stuff to run through to put into press and to quote me completely out of context, which has happened before. Something will happen and people will think, ‘oh, she’s contradicting herself’ – I know I’m full of contradictions. I’m 24 years old and don’t have concrete opinions about everything. I just thought that it’d be more trouble for myself if I kept it there. I’m still going to blog, but be more careful with what I say. I’m trying to learn that sometimes if I think about something I don’t need to answer in public; I just need to think about it myself.

MARINA ON THE GENIUS OF LADY GAGA

The fact that her gender is even questioned is silly.  have nothing to say about it other than that it’s nonsense. That’s dirge, bottom-of-the-barrel of celeb pop culture. I love her because I think she’s very decisive about what she wants, she’s extremely driven, works very hard, and I think that what she’s created is different, and it’s good. She takes re-invention to a whole new level. I definitely couldn’t do that myself, I just don’t know how she has the energy to wear those outfits! I really, really admire her, I think she’s great – she’s a hero of mine.