People like Prince or Madonna, they're kind of superhuman. You can't imagine them burning their toast, and there's something really exciting about that.
— Shura
I couldn't be a Taylor Swift. I would really suck at being Taylor Swift.
Pop music for introverts is an idea I wanted to explore.
You have to make sure you love what you do more than anything.
I take inspiration from so many places. I think, more than anything, it would have to be the music made by others that I've then fallen in love with, whether it's Madonna, Blood Orange, Fleetwood Mac, or Pink Floyd!
I didn't fit in on my football team; I was always the odd one out.
I'm really freaked out by time. How, for instance, what I did last week is not real in the sense that it's happened. It's just a memory that's filed away in my brain.
I think it's much harder now with the Internet to hone anything. It's easy to share things: you do one track, and it goes on Hype Machine; people are being exposed a lot earlier.
I read interviews saying women can bring a femininity to a song, a delicacy, but some women make really aggressive music.
I worked in a post-production facility for television, but in the machine room, so I was one of the nerds, essentially - making sure everyone had their footage in and all of that stuff.
Being part of a crowd and not standing out is way more frightening than being the person that stands out.
I love camping, everything about it - tents, the camping stove, sleeping bags. I'm obsessed with technology, be it synthesizers and speakers or tents and Gore-Tex.
After putting out songs with 26 million views on YouTube, your life changes a little bit. Suddenly everyone's like, 'Where's the album?'
It's really weird when you realize the people you look up to - who have influenced or inspired you - start to realize what you do.
The best thing you can do is having to say no to putting out something that's good, because everything else is better.
It's probably the first type of music we had, rhythm, whether it's poetry or tapping.
Some of the best songs are love songs. They're things that we all go through, and when we're going through it, we think that we're the only person in the world going through that. Having that music there sort of reminds you that you're not alone. It happens to me, too, as a music fan.
There are two ways of dealing with being odd. One is to really try and conform, and the other is to do the opposite and really make a thing out of it. At school, it wasn't that I was bullied, but everyone was very aware that I was different. I was kind of the token weird person that people accepted into their group, almost like an accessory.
The hardest thing is having to do selfies even when you're on your period and you're queuing at Superdrug to get ibuprofen. That's when I'm like, 'You know what? I don't feel like Shura today.'
I made the decision that I could either go outside in the freezing cold in the wind and rain and get muddy or just stay inside and be a rock star.
It's just as important - if not more important - to take the praise with a pinch of salt, just as you do the criticism.
I think there's something antagonistic about bedroom pop. We're reappropriating pop and saying you don't have to be an ex-Disney star to make pop music. You can be from Shepherd's Bush and have spent most of your life listening to the Smiths and still make a pop record.
There's a part of me that's ambitious.
To go from someone who would put something on SoundCloud and maybe get 15,000 plays in a year to getting 100,000 plays in one day felt very weird. I thought I was dying.
Whilst the Internet is amazing, someone with a laptop can make something amazing and send it out, but you grow up creatively in a very public way.
Producing albums is 100 per cent where I would love to be, later in my career.
Sometimes we feel like we're only interacting with what's already happening; we don't actually affect anything - sometimes I feel like that, anyway.
It was never like I had to go, 'I am gay.' Slowly, almost by osmosis, by the way I was behaving, it became obvious and accepted.
If I fancy someone but can't tell them because I'm shy, I'll think, 'It's fine. You're not going to die. Maybe just tell them or whatever.'
A lot of people think I popped out of some pink cloud fully formed, ready for action, but I've been putting songs on SoundCloud since I was 16. Five people would listen and like them. I never had any expectations for myself.
My dad used to do a lot of music when he was young, so he had an 8-track MiniDisc recorder, and when he realized that I was getting on with it, he brought it upstairs to my room and showed me how to record and how, once you finished eight tracks, you can cut it down to two and have another six tracks to play with.
I love being in the studio.
There's something about rhythm and bass sections generally, how the bass and drums interact, that's basically the soul of any song.
With 'White Light,' I had just finished watching 'Under the Skin' and was really obsessed with the idea of science fiction presented as normality.
I suffer from imposter syndrome all the time. Even if I'm just at a party, I'm thinking people are going to find out that I'm really boring.
Pop should be weird, and I realize as I say this that I'm not the weirdest person in the world. But if that means a girl sounding like Kylie Minogue and looking like Kurt Cobain, then so be it.
I was obsessed with 'The Lion King' as a kid, and I really wanted to go work in an animal sanctuary and have my Lara Croft moment.
I'd love to sing with so many people, but my biggest dream would be to sing on a record with The National.
I've tried writing darker, more serious songs, but they don't go anywhere. Everything revolves around the chorus for me.
I know I don't suck at being me. I'm really good at being me.
I'm 23, and if I wanted to release a record when I was 17, I could have released a record, but I'm really glad I didn't.
'What's It Gonna Be?' is about having a massive crush on someone, so it made sense to go back where - to school, where it all began. But it was important for us to explore those archetypal characters - The Jock, The Nerd, The Dork, The Popular Kid - and then flip expectations.
It's strange: I love pop music, and I really can enjoy it, but I didn't feel like the characters within pop music - like when Madonna sings 'Crazy For You', for instance, I don't feel like I would ever be the character she takes on in that song. I would never feel... I don't have that confidence in me.
For me, one song is not enough to be in a person's world. I need to be in their world for 40 minutes; I want to fully experience it and immerse myself.
I want to explore my boundaries. I want to push myself and go right to the edge of what I am capable of. I don't want to ever be comfortable.
I got this advice that if you know a panic attack is happening, just sit back and go, 'Okay, this is happening to me, but it'll be over. You'll be fine. You'll live.'
I don't hate my voice. I'm just not an Adele.
From collaborating with other people, you make concessions, and those concessions are great because sometimes you are definitely wrong.
In London, I used to play 'Boys of Summer,' but it didn't feel right, because it doesn't apply to your surroundings, to the weather. I remember being in L.A. and listening to that record and going, 'Oh, I get it now.'
I'm not one of those artists that can go away for six months and tour America and have 20 producers back in London or L.A. doing everything for me and I just come home and sing on it. It would be really useful, in terms of speed, to work like that. I just wouldn't find it creatively satisfying. I have to have my hand on the remote control.
