We are talking on Zoom, and Clark is waxing lyrical about her emotionally lacerating new album, the self-produced All Born Screaming. She lets out a sigh, mumbling something about a setting on her computer she can't change. She tests it again by doing an exaggerated double thumbs up, only for the screen to be filled with poorly animated fireworks. It all feels very surreal. "Maybe next time I say a solid quote, like a 'Let's make it the pullquote' one, I'll just put two thumbs up," she laughs.
It is not the first time Clark, 41, has attempted to subvert the interview experience, albeit this time accidentally. Around the release of 2017's Masseduction, her "morbidly funny", sad and sexy fifth album, she asked journalists to crawl into a freshly painted neon pink box to ask her questions. "I was sitting in paint fumes for 12 hours - as sadistic as it seemed, trust me it was way more masochistic," she laughs, referring to that time as the "latex era" because of how strict she was being on herself. It was an attempt to continue the severe nature of the album - a reaction to a painful dalliance with the tabloids following her high-profile relationship with model and actor Cara Delevingne in 2015; an aftershock that exploded her carefully curated mythos and its postmodern playfulness.
"To do interviews and to do press is a construct," she says in her glaringly white Los Angeles office (she splits her time between there and New York), looking like "goth Grey Gardens" in black silk headscarf, thick-framed sunglasses and a vintage Maison Margiela trenchcoat I mistake for a dressing gown. "Like I'm playing a role of this person and you're playing a role of that person and wouldn't it be interesting if we both acknowledge it was a construct and went from there. Maybe it would be more pure and more true if we did that," she continues before adding with a delicious cackle: "But then I think people were like, 'Oh she's a cunt'."
هذه القصة مأخوذة من طبعة March 08, 2024 من The Guardian Weekly.
ابدأ النسخة التجريبية المجانية من Magzter GOLD لمدة 7 أيام للوصول إلى آلاف القصص المتميزة المنسقة وأكثر من 9,000 مجلة وصحيفة.
بالفعل مشترك ? تسجيل الدخول
هذه القصة مأخوذة من طبعة March 08, 2024 من The Guardian Weekly.
ابدأ النسخة التجريبية المجانية من Magzter GOLD لمدة 7 أيام للوصول إلى آلاف القصص المتميزة المنسقة وأكثر من 9,000 مجلة وصحيفة.
بالفعل مشترك? تسجيل الدخول
FROM DOCTOR TO BRUTAL DICTATOR THE RISE AND FALL OF ASSAD
0N THE FACE OF IT AT LEAST, the Bashar al-Assad of 2002 presented a starkly different figure from the brutal autocrat he would become, presiding over a fragile state founded on torture, imprisonment and industrial murder.
What fresh alternatives can be used to placate coriander haters?
Everyone knows a hater of coriander - also known as cilantro - who won't go near the stuff. Itamar Srulovich, however, is not one: \"I adore fresh coriander, and always have,\" says the chef/co-owner of the Honey & Co group in London.
Farage is lying in wait.Britain cannot afford to see Starmer fail Jonathan Freedland
This government must not fail. Let's get that clear from the start. If Keir Starmer does not succeed, too many British voters will conclude that both the traditional parties, Labour and Conservative, have proved useless and that it is time to try something else with that something else being nationalist populism.
Compromise may be Macron's only hope of restoring confidence Paul Taylor
Having failed to solve France's political crisis with a prime minister dependent on the far right, President Emmanuel Macron is exploring a deal with the Socialist party (PS) to give the country a new government, pass an overdue budget and avert financial turmoil.
It's a sad story for us all that fewer children are reading for pleasure Rhiannon Lucy Cosslett
On the shelf in my son's bedroom is a row of picture books that once belonged to me.
'Gun control is dead, and we killed it'
Blueprints for 3D-printed weapons are increasingly being used by far-right extremists to evade gun control laws. So what can be done?
Help support the victims of conflict in a volatile world
When we came to choose the theme of our 2024 charity appeal, we quickly realised it would be impossible to ignore that this has been an especially harrowing year of conflict, war and human suffering.
Ring master The Trump circus is already back in town
The grand reopening of Notre Dame cathedral in Paris last Saturday was attended by around 50 heads of state and government.
Object lessons Behind the scenes of a museum's grand reserves
A tour of the newarchive collection of London's Science Museum andits associates reveals a cornucopia of wonders and treasures
Double takes The rise of the celebrity lookalike competition
When Miles Mitchell's friends saw fliers scattered across New York City last month advertising a Timothée Chalamet lookalike competition, they urged the 21-yearold college senior from Staten Island to enter.
