[Janessa] St. Vincent, what's it like where you live?
Because it's pretty boring here on Earth.
[St. Vincent] I mean, I'm a human, you know.
I live part-time in Texas,
and sometimes in New York City, and mostly I live on the road.
[Janessa] Mostly you live in Mars, and everybody's like,
[silly alien-like voice] "I am an alien.
Our master is Bleepblorpbloop."
Is that like, your roommate talks like that?
From space?
[St. Vincent] Do you want me to answer that?
[Janessa] My name's Janessa Slater, and I'm a media coach
who's helped hundreds of bands.
This is Sound Advice.
Why don't you go by your real name, Annie Clark?
You know? 'Cause I think maybe that will balance
kind of all of—
[St. Vincent] Well, I think it's important to carve out a space to be creative.
[Janessa] I feel like you kind of carved out a space and you were like—
You know? Instead of just being like, ooh, here's a little space.
[St. Vincent] You know, I play art rock, so—
also there's a fitness model named Annie Clark,
and a German composer.
So the name was sort of already taken.
[Janessa] You could have done, like,
Annie Clarkson or something, you know, just—
[St. Vincent] You know Prince's real name isn't Prince.
[Janessa] Yeah, but he's actually a prince, right?
Isn't he like prince of the night or something?
Can somebody find out what Prince does?
You know, what he's prince of?
He's prince of something, I know. I just can't think of what it is.
[St. Vincent] Maybe of music.
[Janessa] Well, that's Michael Bolton, but—
[St. Vincent] Yeah.
[Janessa] So you've described your latest self-titled album
as party music that you could play at a funeral.
Now, I went to my ex-husband Darren's aunt's funeral a few years ago,
and I of course brought my Eddie Money CD.
And, you know, you can kind of see where it goes from there.
But the point is we did not get two tickets to paradise.
We more got, like, two tickets to get the hell out of there.
Two tickets to this weird grassy area outside of the graveyard.
Sucked.
But I can't wait to hear your album because, you know—
I have another funeral coming up.
[St. Vincent] So you're giving me advice but you've never actually heard my music.
[Janessa] Yeah. No, I haven't heard your album yet,
because it's like, my fee is only so big,
so it's like, this is what you pay for.
[St. Vincent] What is it exactly that you do for artists?
[Janessa] Oh, I'm a media consultant.
So to me, this is more important
than this.
So I'm just wondering, do you have any, like, dirt
that you want to, like, give to me,
and then I'll, like, leak it to the media?
It's actually really good PR.
[St. Vincent] Um.
[Janessa] Like, let's think of a good scandal for you
to kind of get you out there. >> [St. Vincent] Okay.
[Janessa] Maybe you were caught at a drug store,
and you stole, you know, a beer,
because technically, you thought it said two—
it did say two-for-one, but that promotion had ended.
But you didn't realize it. I don't know.
Maybe you stayed at a hotel and you trashed it,
something like that.
[St. Vincent] I mean, I don't— I wouldn't trash a hotel room, because I—
[Janessa] You don't have to actually trash it.
[St. Vincent] It's a service industry, and usually the people who get tips
aren't the maids, but they ought to.
[Janessa] You could still leave a tip for the maid.
But what I'm saying is then we'll leak to the press,
St. Vincent just stayed at the Royal—whatever,
and she left zero dollars for the maid.
And then everyone'll go, "Oh, who's this St. Vincent?
I should listen to her more. She sounds like a real deev."
[St. Vincent] Or like a cheapskate.
Does a cheapskate sell records?
[Janessa] I've sold records, so.
There's your answer.
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