Janelle Monáe

Christine Kakaire

Please help me welcome Janelle Monáe to the stage.

Janelle Monáe

Hello.

Christine Kakaire

Here I am sitting with Janelle Monáe.

Janelle Monáe

Hi, everybody. How are you guys feeling? Is everyone feeling amazing? As amazing as I’m feeling. I’m so happy to be sitting here speaking with you.

Christine Kakaire

Likewise. I wanted to get started talking about the tour that you’ve just come off because I remember reading a few months ago while you were doing the press cycle for Dirty Computer that you had some feelings of nervousness about how this project was going to be received by the greater public and by your fans. Now that you’re at the other end of this press cycle and of this extensive tour, how are you feeling about it now?

Janelle Monáe

Well, I just wrapped up the European first leg of the Dirty Computer experience and we did the first US leg as well right before we had come on this side of the pond and it’s just been incredible. It has been ... I mean, it’s so hard for me to articulate the emotions that I get looking at all the Dirty Computers from the US, to Paris, to London, to Amsterdam to just all over and there’s just this connection that if I were to put every audience together that they would be the same tribe. They don’t even know it. It’s just like when I go city to city, it’s so, it’s so beautiful and so special and the energy is all connected and we’re connected as a community. It’s been incredible. To answer the first part of your question, I was extremely nervous with this project and putting it out and going back on the road and trying to put together a full production of Dirty Computer because we release the emotion picture with the project and it’s such a visual experience in the concept is strong, and we wanted to figure out, well how do we articulate sonically what people are hearing to the stage? How do we articulate what people have seen from the emotion picture? How do we bring these ideas to the stage? One of the things that we wanted to make sure of is that we were really just connecting with the, I like to call them fandroids, not just fans.

Christine Kakaire

Yes. There’s a few of them here tonight.

Janelle Monáe

On a basic level there needs to be that connection and making sure that they come, they want to hear the songs and how can we build something special around that and just build something that hopefully when they leave the experience that they feel better about life, about themselves, more hopeful, feel celebrated, seen, loved, heard, and all those things and to question that early on. Also, I wanted to do something more as a performer. I challenged myself to play guitar. I challenged myself to do a full-on 24 count dance break in the middle of the show and just so many other things that I did not do, that I had not stretched my muscles, or I hadn’t exercised my muscle in that area. I was nervous. I didn’t know how, what was in my mind and in my heart how all that was going to play out. It’s safe to say that we’ve, I think we’ve put together something special and something that I’m proud of and I’m extremely thankful for all of your support. [applause]

Christine Kakaire

Wonderful. There’s something like Dirty Computer, the pure scale of it, as you mentioned the visual part, the music part. Where does it start? I know that Dirty Computer as a concept actually predates Metropolis, but how...

Janelle Monáe

ArchAndroid.

Christine Kakaire

OK.

Janelle Monáe

That’s OK.

Christine Kakaire

Predates ArchAndroid. Where did you start with the conceiving of this project? Was it the concept, was it the music, was it the visuals?

Janelle Monáe

Sure. Well, I think that it had to do with my need of wanting to build community for marginalized groups that I’ve fell into. Regardless of who I am as an artist today and I’ve had, I’ve been given lots of ... and I’ve worked hard for lots of opportunities to come my way. When I strip off my makeup and my clothes and Janelle Monáe, I’m still a young African American, queer woman born to working class parents in the states, and I identify with many of those groups and I’ve identified growing up my whole life. It was just really important for me to create an experience, a community to where the people that I love and care about that are in those marginalized groups felt like they didn’t have to change who they were to be accepted in society. We accept you at the Church of Dirty Computer. You can continue to embrace those things about you that people deem as bugs and viruses and that they need to be fixed. It’s about cracking our own code and redesigning our DNA or loving our DNA just as it is and feeling like things will work out in our favor because we have each other. We’re here for each other. It started with community first and then I just built everything around that.

Christine Kakaire

I mean, it seems like community is something that is super important to you, especially in your creative process. I know that you created the Wondaland Art Society really early on in your career and from what I understand, it’s like a communal space where people can come and jam and hang out and have lunch together, and all that kind of thing. I’d love to hear a little bit more about how this particular community started for you.

Janelle Monáe

Well, Wondaland is a quite magical, mystical space in many, many different times. It morphs depending on the type of artists that come through. We have visual artists, we have artists, musicians, screenwriters, I mean just artists who want to redefine the blueprint and come together and build together, and we all have our individual superpowers and when we come together it can create something that’s really, really special. It happened, it started in a little tiny city in Atlanta, Georgia in the south. I think the historically black colleges, Morehouse college, Clark, Atlanta University, Spelman, Morris Brown really brought us together because these were like all young black women and men who were just looking to just redefine the future of black entrepreneurship. A lot of people started businesses in Atlanta and so I wanted to become an independent recording artist. I started selling my CDs out of my ... what kind of car? Oh, I had a Mitsubishi Galant. My green Mitsubishi Galant and I was selling my CDs out of my trunk. I was living in a boarding house with six other girls pushing my CDs. I worked at Office Depot. I was selling ink, computer printers. I mean, you name it. I was working, working, working, working but I knew that ultimately I just had a different way of wanting to take my career and I needed to have community though, people who understood what it meant to just package your own CDs and build something from the ground up. Wondaland started as a seed and we’ve been watering it ever since. [applause]

Christine Kakaire

I personally have never been to Atlanta, but I feel like I hear about it and I see about it.

Janelle Monáe

You gotta come.

Christine Kakaire

I’d love to.

Janelle Monáe

Why you ain’t come? You know you need to be in Atlanta.

Christine Kakaire

Alright, let’s sort it out afterwards. I’ll come back with you.

Janelle Monáe

OK.

Christine Kakaire

I love the idea that I have in my mind anyway of this really vibrant, thriving brown town, as they call it, where the African American community is really prevalent. What is it like walking around Atlanta? What do you see? What do you feel?

Janelle Monáe

Well, I mean, it is the home of OutKast. It’s the home of LaFace records, you have the Ushers, and the TLCs, and the Toni Braxtons who came out of there. Goodie Mob, hip hop has always ... the Atlanta hip hop scene has always birthed some real superstars and those artists, the cool thing about Atlanta is while artists are ascending and rising, they’re taking their hand and they’re pulling up other artists and so in the way that the Dungeon Family, OutKast, all of them came together. Big Boi from OutKast and even Andre were mentorships to Wondaland, or mentors to Wondaland. That’s really the great thing. It’s not like everyone’s on an island. We’re collaborating together. Even if you go down there today at Wondaland we have artists like St. Beauty, and Roman GianArthur, and Jidenna, and Deep Cotton. They’re collaborating with each other. We put out projects and everybody’s recording projects in different rooms and we can go in and be inspired by what that artist is doing. That’s the beautiful thing is when you walk around Atlanta you never know. People do multiple things too. You could be waitressing at a nightclub and hop on the stage and have thousands of fans who know your songs and maybe you have never left Atlanta. That was my life for a minute. Yeah, everybody there is ... the food is amazing. There’s a lot of salt on it. You got to be careful. It’s the south. The food is amazing. The music is amazing. What I love most about it though is everybody’s really trying to uplift each other and they understand the importance of collaboration and how if one of us wins, we all win. Yeah. [applause]

Christine Kakaire

I wanted to ... hey, applaud if you like. I wanted to ask you as well about the HBCUs that you mentioned before, the historically black colleges and universities. I’m sure for a lot of people in Europe perhaps like Beyonce’s Coachella performance was a really kind of illustrative moment to kind of convey how important it is culturally and musically. Did you attend one of those universities when you were in Atlanta?

Janelle Monáe

No.

Christine Kakaire

Oh.

Janelle Monáe

Too expensive for me at the time. I studied at the American Musical and Dramatics Academy in New York. I studied acting, and music, and musical theater. When I left school there I moved to Atlanta and I actually lived on the campus of the historically black colleges. I got all the partying. I got to party with everybody but I’d have to pay that tuition. I went to a community college because I was like, I’m not, I had just left expensive ass New York. I was just like, I’m not doing this, but I was absolutely involved in the communities there. I would perform at all the dorm lounges, like literally go into the dorm lounge areas and have a guitar and just be performing, and how I would find out if my music was any good is I would measure by okay, are they stopping it? Most people didn’t stop. I had about three people who would really, really be like, “When are you coming to the dorm lounge again?” Or, “When are you going to be on the library steps?” I did a lot of performances on the library steps. That was my life. [applause] Yeah, that was my life there. I just thought it was a great way to find out, to test your market. I felt like that .. these are the types of people that I want to make music for. What do they think? Also they didn’t know me, you know? It was just like I didn’t have to deal with going back home to Kansas City after school because my mom and my family, they were not disappointed, they just were confused because I’d always spoken about New York, New York, New York. For me to leave because I just, I felt like I had a very particular way of writing, storytelling that I wanted to make happen but being a part of that musical theater community was limiting in ways. As helpful as it was I felt like it limited me explore my own ideas and what I want to say in my own voice. Not being able to hear my own voice. Atlanta University center was my home, but I didn’t have to spend all the money to live there.

Christine Kakaire

It sounds like a very smart university hack there.

Janelle Monáe

Yes. Yeah. Yeah. I love it. I met pretty much all the people that I collaborate with who’s a part of Wondaland. Nate, Rocket Wonder, went to Morehouse. Mikael Moore who’s there, went to Morehouse. Chuck Lightning, I mean I met some really amazing... Kelli Andrews went to Clark Atlanta University. Some really incredible people who are right now working with me to this day with Wondaland and with my career.

Christine Kakaire

Yeah. It is really interesting to kind of look through the liner notes of the music that you’ve produced and seeing the names of your collaborators repeating over and over again. How do you all communicate within your kind of like little ecosystem in Wondaland? Do you need to be explicit with each other? Can you pick up each other’s cues? Do you fall out with each other? How does this dynamic develop? Especially with such a…

Janelle Monáe

All the above. All the above. Yeah, I think like any community in any... it is a business as well. You have your highs, you have lows, you have tough conversations that you have to have. The great thing about Wondaland is everybody is a protector of love and a protector of making sure that love is at the center of what it is that we do. It’s like if it’s constructive criticism, you know it’s coming from a loving place, you know that it’s coming from a place of just wanting to see our community grow, making sure that it works for all of us and not just some of us. There’s a lot of laughter, a lot of debates around what song should be on albums and what single should be released first. We have this place where we call it the giving room. Some people may call it a living room but it’s a giving room where you give all your thoughts and your comments around the art that’s going to go out and you step in the middle of this grass area and you stand there and then you say, “Hey, I think that this song should not go on the album because, or I think that this song should go on the album.”

Janelle Monáe

We have those friendly debates. None of us take it too seriously and we don’t want to take the fun out of it. It’s important for us to be having fun in the process because our time is limited here. Why spend it or waste it not having memorable experiences that we can all look back on and be proud of and feel like I really, we really did fucking live our lives on earth. That’s what it’s about. It’s about doing it with the people you love and I’m happy to be doing that. [applause]

Christine Kakaire

Well, it certainly sounds like you found your home in Atlanta. I would love to ask you a little bit about your birth home, which is a Kansas, Kansas City. I mean we can talk a little bit more about your upbringing, but I’m curious, what did Kansas give to you musically or culturally that you’re still carrying with you, if anything?

Janelle Monáe

Oh my gosh. I feel so blessed to have grown up in Kansas. Kansas has shaped me immensely. I mean, I am from the majority Republican place and I’m also, I live in the ... native Americans were there, like they were everywhere in the United States of America before a lot of people got there. I am from a county called Wyandot county and it’s predominantly African American, Hispanic, and it’s actually the poorest county in Kansas City, Kansas. Growing up to my working class parents, my mom was a janitor, my dad, biological father was a trash man, and my stepdad who was just like my dad worked at the post office. I grew up watching them work their asses off wearing uniforms every day. I still wear my black and white to pay respect to them. My grandmother was a sharecropper in Aberdeen, Mississippi. She picked cotton, she had 14 brothers and sisters. They shared one pair of shoes and she ended up working her way to Kansas City. That’s how my family got there. She served food in the county jail for 25 years. She ended up having 12 kids. My mother was the youngest and she owned four homes and she was the best grandmother that anybody could have asked for. I strive to be like ... she is somebody that just at her core, I wish I can be more like she’s a very service oriented person, a giving person, and a forgiving person. Growing up understanding what it meant to work with the folks who were cleaning up the community and making nothing out of something has given me perspective. When I walk into a venue that I’ve sold out, if it’s 8,000 seats I’m speaking to every janitor. I’m speaking to every person who comes into my hotel room, or I walk past them I try my best to make eye contact and let them know that I see you, I’m not above you, and what I’m doing, wearing my uniform and doing what it is that I’m doing is to pay homage to you because my parents are me so we are all connected. I try to just live life understanding that you can’t get too high. You can’t get too low. Tip on a tight rope, stay balanced. You can be a sandwich away from being poor. What would you do then? [applause]

Christine Kakaire

Yeah. Thank you. I think that mention of you and your uniform as you call it, your black and white aesthetic, I’d love to dig into that a little bit, but first of all I wanted to ask in relation to Dirty Computer, I did notice because it is like so visually gorgeous and vivid and I noticed that in a particular ... in a couple of particular videos, I believe it was for “Screwed” and “Django Jane,” that you’re wearing quite bold colors, which seems to be a pretty significant move for your aesthetic. What was the reasoning behind that?

Janelle Monáe

Well, I think that with this project it was important for me to embrace all of me. I told myself that this time around I wanted to explore publicly all the many sides and me, some people privately get these sides of Janelle Monáe and I thought it was just important, and it was more so, it was kind of selfish in a sense. It was freeing for me to tap into the dimensions that I have, that we have as women, as human beings. I think that I’m evolving. I think that it’s important that I don’t become a slave to my own interpretations of who I am or what the public thinks about me. It’s important to not pigeonhole myself, to not get comfortable, to rest on my laurels, but to make sure that I’m constantly creating art, and I’m experimenting and I’m unafraid to make art that folks may not understand at that time. It’s important as an artist that you’re stretching those muscles. Some of my favorite artists have always moved to their soul clock, moved when they felt the need to move. Talked about certain things when they felt the need to talk about them. That was important this time around in terms of clothing. All of that was just me saying, hey, this is where I am at the time. This is important that you understand that I’m not a monolith. I have depth. I have just like all of us, we have so many different sides of us and it was fun. It’s important to continue to have fun in that process too.

Christine Kakaire

Yeah, absolutely. I want to kind of go back to the original Janelle Monáe or Cindi Mayweather aesthetic with the tuxedo suit, but before we go back in time, I want to ask specifically about the pants in “PYNK.” Can we talk about them? [applause]

Janelle Monáe

The infamous “PYNK” pants. Well, they are locked away in a safe.

Christine Kakaire

OK. They didn’t go on tour with you?

Janelle Monáe

Oh yes. Yeah. They were on tour with me, but they’re not, right now they’re very protected.

Christine Kakaire

OK. Precious PYNK pants.

Janelle Monáe

Two very strong women.

Christine Kakaire

OK.

Janelle Monáe

Guard them tightly. Yeah. It’s real.

Christine Kakaire

The pink, I’m just going to say it, the pink pussy pants. Where did this idea originate from? From what I understand, you released the videos for “Django Jane,” what…

Janelle Monáe

“Make Me Feel.”

Christine Kakaire

“Make Me Feel” first, and then the video for PYNK kind of hit the Internet.

Janelle Monáe

Yeah.

Christine Kakaire

What was the kind of process of conceiving this aesthetic?

Janelle Monáe

Well, we were, when we were putting together visuals for each song, we wanted to make sure that one, the story was cohesive. It takes place in this place called the House of the New Dawn where there abducting dirty computers and they’re cleansing them. They’re stripping away their identity and making them torches. Who then would serve as personal nurses for the new dirty computers who are going to be getting their identity stripped away. You go into the mind of Jane 57821 played by me. You go into my memories as they’re deleting my memories, and each visual, each video is a memory. Or a dream. Yes.

Christine Kakaire

OK, we’ll come back to that.

Janelle Monáe

Yes. You can see Jane 57821 fighting. You know, “Django Jane.” That is her. That is a very clear dream that she has as they’re trying to strip her identity away. She’s fighting back during that moment. Not a lot of people know that, so I just gave you…

Christine Kakaire

Exclusive.

Janelle Monáe

Some tea. But “PYNK” specifically is a celebration. It comes during the celebration part of the album. The album is broken up into three parts. The first few songs represent the ... I’m sorry, I’m on a different timezone right now.

Christine Kakaire

You just got off a plane. It’s totally understandable.

Janelle Monáe

Yes. They represent the, help me out right now. The…

Christine Kakaire

Reckoning?

Janelle Monáe

The reckoning, yes. Sorry. Okay. I have another R. The first four songs represent the reckoning. Imagine being called a bitch for the first time by a man, as a woman. Imagine being called a nigger for the first time as a black person in America. Imagine just someone using language to degrade you. Well that’s what a Dirty Computer means in this society. You spend those first four songs saying, reckoning with the fact that in this society, you are less than. You are not, you’re not enough. You need to be cleansed and reprogrammed into what our society thinks that you would be most beneficial as to us.

Janelle Monáe

Then you go through the middle part of the album, which is the celebration of what it means to be a Dirty Computer. You have songs like “PYNK” and you have songs like “Make Me Feel.” You have songs like “Django Jane.” You have those songs that are really, really meant to empower Dirty Computer’s women. It’s meant to be very much so, just very much so sexually making sure that you understand that, “I’m a liberated woman,” during that section. It’s just being very unapologetic. Then the last few songs represent the reclamation, and reclaiming what it means to be American. Because this is a very American album, as much as it’s global, and I think there’s this interconnectedness that we all have. I could only write this project from my truth and my perspective, and the things that I have been able to see over these ... Yeah. The things that I’ve been able to see and experience. It’s saying that, “I am a Dirty Computer, and I too am American. Although this system is not working in my favor, it will be my country one day.” [applause] That’s pretty much kind of thesis for Dirty Computer, those three stages. The reckoning, the celebration, and the reclamation. Pink comes through the celebration. The celebration of women. I know you call them pussy pants.

Christine Kakaire

I’m sorry for being crude.

Janelle Monáe

No no no. No, see? Right there. Pussy. Come on. But people call them labia pants. People call them flowers. You know. I just want to be clear too that one of the things that’s important is that people know that I don’t believe that women who may not have vaginas, I don’t believe that they should not be considered women. You don’t have to have a vagina to be a woman. That’s why we had, we had the girls, there were some women in there who did not have the pants on, because we wanted to make sure that it was being as inclusive as possible, while coming from a very personal place for me.

Christine Kakaire

I think that’s a very important message. Let’s talk a little bit more about “Americans.” Which is the track that closes the album. I find is fascinating, but I also feel like it feeds into a tradition of artists like David Bowie or Bruce Springsteen making songs that on the surface are really up temp and sound inspiring, and people can misinterpret them as being very kind of jingoistic or nationalistic, but if you look at the lyrics it’s quite scathing.

I think that your track “Americans” fits into that narrative. Were you kind of aware of the history of other artists doing things like that? Or even Childish Gambino, “This Is America,” which is on the one hand like a get down dance floor jam, but if you kind of read into the visuals it’s something a little bit different. Does that resonate with you?

Janelle Monáe

Well I mean, when I wrote “Americans,” I wrote that song in two to three days. I had a first draft of it, and it was going to be called “Southern Man" actually. It was coming from the perspective of what it meant to be this white male in the south, and him saying, “This is my America. These are the things. Don’t try to take my country.” It was meant to come from that perspective. Then I started coming, I said, “No. I feel like there are a lot more people who have something to say.” I started to get these visions of other Americans. It started to go from the perspective of the black woman and the perspective of the middle aged white women. Then this white man. It kept going and going. Then what I came to, what I settled on was something that highlighted different characteristics about Americans, and it showed that they all were all fighting for our voices to be heard. It’s like, depending on where you are in the song, you get a different perspective. But then it’s important, it can also be looked at as the Dirty Computers or the marginalized saying, “Hey. This is my America too,” because you have the preacher. He’s not a pastor anymore, but his name ... His name slips my mind right now. Sean. Yes. Sean McMillan is his name. Hi Sean McMillan. I want to give you a shout out. He really helped inspire the lyrics in the song, because he was saying that, you know, “Until poor whites can get an opportunity at getting more jobs, and until Black folks don’t have to come home from a police stop and get shot in the head, until same gender loving people can be who they are and love who they are, until our Latina and Latino brothers and sisters don’t have to run from walls, this is not my America. But it will be my America before it’s all over.” That is really at the core, what my song “Americans” represents. It’s not saying, “I live in America. We’re so perfect.” It’s actually highlighting the disappointing things. The hateful things that the abusers of power are doing to our communities. It’s saying that we as all these different voices have to remember that we have to coexist. We have to figure out how we’re going to get along, and we better fucking figure it out fast. You know? Because we have another generation of people being ushered in, and we have to create a much more inclusive space. We have to ... We don’t have to, but it would be great for us to figure out not to let our egos get in the way of their better future. [applause]

Christine Kakaire

Was the political turmoil that the US has been gripped by in the last couple of years, to what extent did that feed into your decision to kind of expose more parts of yourself? Parts of Janelle Monáe the person, as opposed to these characters that you had been embodying for so many years. Is that kind of like a direct link to make?

Janelle Monáe

Say the first part...

Christine Kakaire

The kind of atmosphere of politics in the US.

Janelle Monáe

Oh, OK.

Christine Kakaire

How much…

Janelle Monáe

How did politics influence?

Christine Kakaire

Yeah. Did that feed into your decision to release Dirty Computer now?

Janelle Monáe

Yeah. I mean obviously you guys watch the news. You are probably up to speed on what’s going on. I just want to say right now, I don’t support the current president, or that establishment. I want that to be very clear. If it wasn’t clear enough. I don’t consider myself a politician. I’m thankful to be an artist who can use music as a way to unite people. I feel like that’s my job, is to unite and do that through music. There are all sorts of people who come to the shows. We may not all have the same political beliefs. Some people probably voted him in. But they’re there. We get the opportunity to share something very special, and I get the opportunity to speak on behalf of Dirty Computers, on behalf of marginalized communities, and hopefully through the songs and through love and through all that, maybe that can change somebody’s mind about who I am and where I come from, and the people that I’m trying to help fight for. Hopefully that can happen, right? For me it wasn’t really about trying to continue to be divisive, and point fingers. Obviously I’m voting. I’m exercising my rights. I’m trying to vote smart. But it wasn’t, it’s not about jumping on a hate train for the current president. It’s about, “How can I celebrate those who really need it most?” I had to ask myself, who was I OK with pissing off? Who did not really give a fuck about supporting what it is that we were trying to do, and how could I ask those people to lean in that do have the power to help the folks that I want to celebrate and love, who do come from a more privileged background? How can I do that? How can I be a uniter? That’s what I’m focused on. I’m focused on bridging gaps and making sure that I’m celebrating those who need it most, and keeping my focus there.

Christine Kakaire

I mean, you talk about having to figure out who you’re going to piss off or who you’re going to be okay with pissing off. But I would also imagine that this process of letting people in or letting people see more of you must also at the same time be liberating somehow? Yeah?

Janelle Monáe

Yeah. It can be liberating, or it can also be, it can be, yeah. I mean, it’s cool. I’ve never been that type of person where I feel pressure to have to answer anything that I don’t want to answer, or talk about anything that I don’t want to talk about. Just like any free ass motherfucker out here.

Christine Kakaire

I was watching an interview where you used that same phrase to apply to yourself, and also to apply to the person that you considered to be your mentor. The sadly missed and sadly lost Prince. I’m sorry, I know this is a bit of a downer. But it would be really wonderful to hear you talk a little bit about his impact on you musically, because I know that he didn’t contribute to this album, but his spirit or his essence kind of comes through in various songs. It would be great to hear about how you processed that loss, I suppose, through your music. Or where you think his influence still lies in your music.

Janelle Monáe

I must start off by just saying, it is difficult for me to articulate how much he means to me and what he means to Wondaland. I must say that without Prince, without Paisley Park, I don’t think Wondaland, me, I don’t think we would even know how far we could push art and what we could do with music and with ideas. He was thinking outside the box for a very, very long time, and he was executing at an extremely high level. It’s difficult to even model your career after Prince. He is a genius in so many ways. On the business side of things. He’s a guitar slayer. I mean, producing and writing and just, he’s a world. A world that continued to morph and morph and go into different worlds right before our eyes. It was great to have that as inspiration. But I think it was greater to have him as a mentor, and to be able to have a conversation like this, often with him. For him to pop up at our shows secretly and ride around the venue, and have after parties, and lock us in the house for seven hours and just play music. Like if I’m here, he’d be where this speaker is, playing “Purple Rain” with the band. Having so many amazing memories. The one thing that sticks out is that Prince was a giver. He was a giver of his time to new and upcoming artists. When I first came out he was like, “I’m here for you. Whatever you need in your career. I think you’re thinking in the right way. I’ll always let you know if you need, I’m always here if you need to talk. I’m always here for Wondaland. I’m at your guys’ service.” That’s what I feel most inspired by, is that he didn’t allow his mystery to get in the way of his mentorship. [applause]

Christine Kakaire

Are you a mentor to anybody?

Janelle Monáe

I am.

Christine Kakaire

Yeah?

Janelle Monáe

Yeah. I think so. I mean, I could be better. My time, I’m always, I’m here. I’m doing a lot of different things outwardly. But I have folks in my family, younger cousins that I try to be mentors for. In different ways. If they’re trying to launch their business or their careers, I’ve helped in many ways. I think the most important thing is, people just want time. Your time. I’m trying to do better about that. I do have some beautiful artists by the name of Saint Beauty. They’re part of Wondaland Arts Collective, and they are incredible writers and performers. They’re playing instruments. I just feel like those are my babies. I love them so much. I’ve been really trying to help them. They went on tour with me this last Dirty Computer leg in the US. Yeah, I hope that I can be a better mentor though. I can do better in that area.

Christine Kakaire

I’m sure you’re a great mentor.

Janelle Monáe

My niece loves me, so that’s all that matters. I can do no wrong in her eyes.

Christine Kakaire

Perhaps we can talk a little bit about some of the collaborators that you’ve worked with. We’ve mentioned Prince. The list of artists that you worked with on Dirty Computer is pretty fascinating. Brian Wilson. Tell us all about that.

Janelle Monáe

Brian Wilson. Brian Wilson. Give it up. Beach Boys. Yeah, I mean like so many people I’m a huge Beach Boys/Brian Wilson fan. When I was writing “Dirty Computer” with Nate, Rocket Wonder, when we were singing the vocals it just, we kept hearing “In My Room” in our head. I kept hearing his tone. I just reached out. I had someone from my team reach out to his manager, and we got an email back saying ... You know, we reached out and I wrote this nice note. I was like, “I would be honored if you would be a part of the project.” He wrote back and he was like, “Yeah. Send me a tape in the mail.” It was so funny. “A tape? OK. I don’t know where I’m going to find a tape,” but he really did want a tape. His manager was like, “Yeah. We need to figure this out,” so we had to figure it out. He listened to the song, and he cut his vocals. He was the first feature on Dirty Computer. He was very fast. It was incredible.

Christine Kakaire

Did you always know that that was going to be opening the album? That that was going to be...

Janelle Monáe

Mm-hmm. I did. At first we were like, “Oh. It should open with “Americans.” Do something upbeat,” but I was like, “No. You’ve got to bring people into the mind of what it means to be a Dirty Computer. This is introspective. This is, you’re walking into the psyche of me.” It just felt like it was a great entry point.

Christine Kakaire

One of the other collaborations was on the track “Screwed,” which I mentioned before. I want to ask you a little bit about one of the lyrics, which I think is really interesting. But on that track it featured Zoe Kravitz.

Janelle Monáe

Yes. Love her.

Christine Kakaire

Do you go way back? Have you known each other for a while?

Janelle Monáe

I was just with Zoe last night. We were in London. We share the same birthday, so we have a connection.

Christine Kakaire

When is your birthday?

Janelle Monáe

December 1st.

Christine Kakaire

What star sign are you?

Janelle Monáe

It depends on the day.

Christine Kakaire

OK. Moon’s constantly moving, that kind of thing.

Janelle Monáe

Yeah. Constantly. But yeah, Zoe, it just felt right. She and I, we performed at this festival called Afropunk Fest. I don’t know if you guys heard of that in Brooklyn. I was one of the first artists to perform at the festival when it was, shoot, it was probably like 200 and just 300 people. Now it’s tens of thousands of folks coming out. I was performing on a little stage. I obviously knew about Zoe from her parents. She has famous, incredibly gifted parents. But I found out she was in a band called Elevator Fight, and they were also performing at Afropunk. I went to go watch their show, and I was like, “This girl is crazy.” Then I was like, “Oh,” and then I found out we had the same birthday, and I was like, “Oh. Makes sense.” I’m like that sometimes. I’m like, “You know what? Yeah, that makes sense. We have the same birthday. That’s why you like that water. I like that water too.” Sometimes I can be like that. But we’ve just had a connection since then, and we’ve kept in contact. We emailed each other and we said, “We have to do something together. The first person who has the idea should email, reach out to that person.” I had the idea first, and it was “Screwed.” I just, I wanted to create something that was up tempo, upbeat, that was highlighting what we were experiencing, what we were feeling. While we’re trying to be young, wild, and free, and have sex and have parties and do all these things. You just feel like there’s a world going on around you that is just full of, any day you just feel like there could be a war. What tweet is going to be sent out that could start a nuclear bomb going over in the States? These are things that are options, you know?

Christine Kakaire

It’s real, yeah.

Janelle Monáe

You don’t want to think like that, but it just talks about, while we’re celebrating, having parties, there’s a world where there are families being broken apart. There’s a world where all that is. It’s encouraging at the same time to say, “You know what? You don’t want to do gun reform? Fuck it. We’ll put water in your fucking guns. That’s what we’ll do. We’ll just take all your machine guns, we’ll crush them, and we’ll make them water guns and we’ll give them out as gifts for Christmas.”

Christine Kakaire

“And you will like them.”

Janelle Monáe

Everywhere, yeah. It’s kind of, it’s a slap in the face and a kick in the balls to the status quo. [applause]

Christine Kakaire

There’s a spoken word section in Screwed. The line is, I believe if my memory serves, “Everything is just sex except sex which is power.”

Janelle Monáe

“Now ask yourself who’s screwing you.” I thought you were going to ask me about, “You fucked the world up now, we’ll fuck it all back down.”

Christine Kakaire

I mean you can talk…

Janelle Monáe

Because I have a funny story about that.

Christine Kakaire

Please, proceed.

Janelle Monáe

I went on tour in, it was probably around the ArchAndroid era. No, because we couldn’t afford a tour bus, so it wasn’t there. It was whenever I could afford, we finally had a budget to get a tour bus, because we were riding around in a church van. Prior to that. A white church van. I shared, we all shared, it was just one bus. The band, crew everybody were all on one bus. I walked on my bus. If you know me, I can’t record in a studio with food everywhere, or cords out. Everything has to be neat and clean and smelling good. Especially my room as well. Although some would be like, “You’re very messy.” But whenever I’m writing, I need to be in a clear room. A clean room. Whenever I go to sleep I need the room to be clean.

Janelle Monáe

We were on the bus and the band was there. I walked on, and we had just done a show. I was ready to celebrate, and I looked around, and there was pizza boxes and socks and drawers all on the floor. I was like, “Uh uh. Uh uh.” I was like, “Whoever fucked this bus up, y’all better fuck it back down.” I don’t even know where that came from. It’s like, you know what it means but you’re like, “What made you think of that?.” It was just a reflex, and it ended up in the song. It was like, you know what I’m saying? “You fucked the world up now, we’ll fuck it all back down.”

Christine Kakaire

What was the response though when you said that? Did they snap into action, or did they laugh?

Janelle Monáe

They laughed at me.

Christine Kakaire

OK.

Janelle Monáe

Then they went into action. Yeah, they went into action. They laughed, but they went into action, and it just stuck around. I had the line for about seven years. Yeah. The line for seven years, and I was like, “This is what it means.” Then it also is just a conversation. There’s a conversation to be had about how women, how women of color in particular, are always out on the front lines. How we were, when you think about certain wars, when you think about the war between the south and the north and when we were fighting to end slavery, you think about all those things, it was Black folks, and it was women also, on the front lines. We were the first people out there. I think that that continues to happen. You continue to see us, despite how the world can treat us and how they’ve treated us historically, we continue to help clean up a lot of shit. When you look at people marching out in the streets, which, that was a huge inspiration for me. I created a song. We made an anthem called “Hell You Talmbout.” I know you said you’re going to ask me about that. But when you look at all the pictures online, and when you look at the faces who are out there, there are a lot of black women who are out there marching, hand in hand, and they’re not just black women. If you look at the women’s march that was started right after the election ... I don’t know, did you guys see that?

Christine Kakaire

Yeah.

Janelle Monáe

It’s incredible. “Screwed” was really inspired by those faces, those people saying, “We know that we didn’t screw it up,” but we feel like it’s our responsibility to fix it.

Christine Kakaire

We’ll screw it down.

Janelle Monáe

We’ll screw it down.

Christine Kakaire

Did you perform at the women’s march?

Janelle Monáe

I spoke.

Christine Kakaire

You spoke?

Janelle Monáe

Yeah, I did perform. Yes, I performed. Let me tell you about that, the women’s march, they didn’t know that that many people were gonna show up. I didn’t know. I didn’t have a speech prepared. They were just like ... I had just done Hidden Figures, and I was on promo tour, and they had asked me to come and say some words. They were like, “Yeah, we’re doing just a little march, and we just want you to come onstage and say a few words.” I was like, “Sure.” When I get there, I was like, “Oh my Lord.” There were hundreds and hundreds of thousands of people there. You couldn’t even really see the stage because there was such a sea of people. If you’re looking at the stage, it was just like a tiny stage. They were right about that, but it was like a million people watching it. I was scared. I was freaking out. Angela Davis was walking backstage. You had the mothers of a lot of the young black kids who have been killed because of the abusive power in the police department. There were activists there. There were actresses. There were musicians. It was just a lot, and I was really nervous. I just went up there and I just spoke from the heart. Yeah, I just tapped in. I think I was on Hidden Figures promo. Hidden Figures was set in the 1960s, so a lot of the things that I had been watching to get into my character, it was really crazy that a lot of those things felt like they were still happening today. It was just in my heart. I just had that fighting spirit with me from coming to do that, coming up doing the movie. A few days after the election, after we got that news, so yeah, I did that. I think you can see it online. If you don’t know what we’re talking about, you can go online and watch it.

Christine Kakaire

I definitely want to ask you about your film roles into extraordinary films: Hidden Figures and Moonlight. We’ll come back to that. You mentioned the track, which I can’t justify saying it in my accent, like, “What you talking about?”

Janelle Monáe

The hell you talking about?

Christine Kakaire

The hell you talking about? There we go. It just doesn’t work in my accent.

Janelle Monáe

I love your accent. It’s cute. Where are you from again?

Christine Kakaire

Australia.

Janelle Monáe

You’re from Australia?

Christine Kakaire

Yeah.

Janelle Monáe

Wow.

Christine Kakaire

Yeah.

Janelle Monáe

Australia day. Do you go to Australia Day?

Christine Kakaire

No, that’s a pretty controversial topic.

Janelle Monáe

Oh.

Christine Kakaire

Yeah. Invasion Day is what we like to call it.

Janelle Monáe

OK, alright.

Christine Kakaire

We can talk about that backstage.

Janelle Monáe

OK, backstage.

Christine Kakaire

You released this track, “The Hell You Talmbout?” It’s the last time.

Janelle Monáe

I love it.

Christine Kakaire

Nope, it’s dead. I killed it. It was really incredible. The first time I watched it I had to kind of pause it part of the way through because it’s super emotional. Just a very raw video, very basic kind of drum beat. Several of your artists, your Wondaland artists, are literally just calling out the names of people who have died at the hands of either police violence or racial violence in general in the United States. What was... I mean, obviously we can all understand the motivation behind, but what was the story behind putting together this song and releasing this as a pretty clear statement?

Janelle Monáe

Regardless if we’re artists, if we’re working in this business, we’re human beings first. As a human, just thinking about somebody’s life being taken because of the color of their skin or because they had on a hoodie, Trayvon Martin. Sandra Bland, being taken to jail because she didn’t speak the way an officer wanted her to speak. Rekia Boyd, I mean, we can go on and on. There are so many names that we called out. It was just us giving a release to so many people, including ourselves. We needed to say that personally. We just felt like, “How can we contribute?” We knew people were doing a lot of marches. There were people who were really out on the front lines, and I was not out there as much as some of the families and friends of these people were. We just thought, “Here is ... this song is a vessel. This is a tool for you. Use it. Say your loved ones name. This is how I want to contribute. When you want to give up, when you get tired, put this on, take it with you, speak it, and let it be therapy.” Let’s honor them. Let’s never forget them. [applause]

Christine Kakaire

I found it pretty interesting, while I was scrolling through YouTube after I’d watched that video, to see that David Byrne of Talking Heads fame and also a very well established and well respected solo artist has taken to incorporating this song into his performances. Were you aware of that? How did that all come about?

Janelle Monáe

Yes, he reached out to me. First of all, I love David Byrne. He’s a big musical hero to me, and an incredible person and human being. For him to reach out to me and tell me, “Hey, I’m really moved by “Hell You Talkmbout,” and I want to ... I, as a white male, I want to honor these young black/brown women and men who were murdered because of the abuse of power in the police force and around. I want to honor them. I want to be an ally to you guys. For him to say that, and write me and say, “I’m gonna shout you out and let people know you guys started this,” I just thought it was just so ... it was such a godlike thing to do, for somebody of his caliber to reach out to me and ask for that type of permission, and to continue to own it, and to continue to be an ally to those families and those friends, and to let people know that he sees us. I think that we need more of that, you know? Right now, that’s the space that I’m in. How can we be allies to each other? How can more privileged folks protect those who don’t have the access, who don’t have the second chances that you may get? How can you protect those? How can cisgendered folks protect those in the LGBTQIA community? How can I, as a black woman, help protect my Latina sisters? You know what I’m saying? How can we really become allies to each other? I think what David Byrne is doing through music is a great example of that. [applause]

Christine Kakaire

Yeah. Let’s wind back a little bit to Hidden Figures. I find it fascinating that you were appearing in this film at the same time that the women’s march was happening, and also in the wake of the election of Donald Trump to his presidency. How did this project find you, Hidden Figures?

Janelle Monáe

I like that you say that. It did find me. It really did. We found each other. I got sent the script through my agency. I’ve been sent a few scripts that I was like, “OK, this could be cool. I could do this,” and I had just done Moonlight. Moonlight was my first film. I did Moonlight, and I was approached for Hidden Figures, to read Hidden Figures. While I was reading it, I didn’t know if it was ... I thought it was a fictitious story because I had never heard of these women. I’d never heard of Catherine Johnson, Dorothy Vaughn, Mary Jackson, the women who were responsible for doing the calculations, The Human Computers, that’s what they were called, who did the calculations for the astronauts to go into space. How could that not be taught in our classes? How could I just not know? I’m a young black woman. How could I not know about these extraordinarily gifted black woman who were geniuses working at NASA during the segregation era? Once I found out it was a true story, I just said, “I have to honor them.” I wanted to do everything I could to make sure that their stories did not get erased anymore than what I felt they had already been erased from me. It was just an incredible project to be a part of. I have some sisters in Taraji and Octavia.

Christine Kakaire

What does film acting give you that your music projects don’t?

Janelle Monáe

That’s a great question. The difference between releasing and album and doing a film is that when you are doing a film you are doing what’s best for that character. You’re a part of an ensemble. Everything you do is to support that story, that character. When you put out an album, it’s you. Everything you say, every guitar riff, every lyric, every piece of the album, artwork, it’s all under your name. If you say something, it’s, “She said that,” not, “The film,” or, “Somebody in the film said it.” It’s under you, and these are your thoughts. People assume this is your story. It’s more autobiographical in a sense. I feel more pressure to do music than I do acting because with music it’s coming from you, and the world is gonna say, “These are your ideas,” and I’m very close. I write and I collaborate as well, but it’s always this feeling of like, “Oh, I’m gonna be judged. I’m in a vulnerable state right now, or I’m in a very fragile state right now, and I have to go out and promote this. I might be judged by the types of things I want to talk about now. Will people continue to support me now that I’m in this new phase?” It can be, if you’re not ready when it’s time to release the album, if you haven’t said like, “Hey, this is where I am,” you really got to have a talk with yourself before you release a project because it’ll seem more personal when critics makes comments or when supporters or fans ... it all just feels like this is a look or this is commentary about me as a person. In a sense ... but it’s also exciting. It’s very exciting to be able to go out and do something bold. To say, “Yeah, I said it. I’m here. Let’s do this. We’re doing this. This is where I am, and I want to contribute. Come with me,” if you will. All of it is about balance. Never get too high off the praises that people give you, and never get too low off the criticism. Just stay very balanced.

Christine Kakaire

Let’s talk about Moonlight, which is, if anybody hasn’t seen it, just do it. It’s really, really extraordinary. Your performance is also really extraordinary because it’s very raw. It’s very visceral. You can feel the heat from Florida. You can see the weariness in these people’s faces.

Janelle Monáe

It was very hot. How many of you guys have been to Florida? Oh, OK. You’ve been to Miami? OK, alright.

Christine Kakaire

I guess it’s easy now, at this point, to kind of draw links between the Janelle Monáe that we know now, post-Dirty Computer, and the struggles of the young protagonist in Moonlight who is grappling with his sexual identity. What was it that brought you into the film? Was it the story? Was it the people connected to it? Tell us about it.

Janelle Monáe

It was all of that. It was seeing Chiron, there’s so many Chiron’s in my community. When I looked at him, and when I read the screenplay, he jumped out as a little cousin to me. Somebody that I knew. Teresa played, she was like a surrogate mom to him. His mother was on drugs, and she just wasn’t there to be in his life like he needed her. My husband in the movie, played by the great Mahershala Ali, he ... yes, shout out. He and I, we took him in. As he’s trying to figure out his sexual identity, we’re there with him. He asks us, “What is a faggot?” because he had been called that. He’s been teased, and he’s going through all these things. One of the things I wanted to do was just be a great listener. It taught me that it’s just most important to just listen. Sometimes we can talk to just hear ourselves, or we’re talking just because we want to pacify somebody or we want to make them feel good. We’re like, “Well, let’s just jump in,” or it could be a nervous tick, but the thing that Chiron needs, and what I wanted to make sure that when people were watching it that they could watch and apply to the conversation that they may be having with someone young who is trying to understand their sexual identity… The thing that I wanted people to day away was that sometimes all it takes is for us to just listen, not judge, not try to push anybody any one way. Sometimes it’s just important for us to listen. Yeah, listen, that’s it.

Christine Kakaire

Do you have any other film projects in the pipeline at the moment?

Janelle Monáe

I do. I have Welcome To Marwen, will be coming out, as directed by the great Robert Zemeckis. He did a lot of my favorite films like Castaway. He worked on Back To The Future. You all know his work. I worked with him and a great ensemble, Steve Carell, Eiza Gonzalez, just some really, really beautiful people. That should come out in December.

I have a couple other things that I’m doing. Then I’m gonna come back on tour. I think I’ll be back here next year. I’m excited about that.

Christine Kakaire

In one of the interviews that I was reading in preparation for this, speaking of films, I read that during the making of Dirty Computer that the production of Black Panther was happening down the road, essentially. The actors and the crew would come and hang out at Wondaland. What was that like?

Janelle Monáe

A moment. It was a moment for sure. We had lots of great moments. That’s also the cool thing about Atlanta, people are making movies there now. I made Hidden Figures in Atlanta. Black Panther was made in Atlanta. It was great to have Chadwick Boseman over, and Lupita, and Michael B., Daniel as well. All of them are my friends. When they were just talking to me about the production, before the movie, I was working on Dirty Computer, and I was telling them about it. They came over and we hosted them. They were like the first people to listen to the album. It just felt good to just get their positive vibes. They were up dancing til four in the morning. They texted me afterwards. That helped me because I was making… I remember having to make some real big decisions about what I wanted to talk about, just what songs were gonna be on there, and where I wanted to go, and to just hear the words ... to just get affirmation from them like, “You’re on the right path. We’re really excited about this,” was a beautiful thing. To also hear what Ryan Coogler was gonna be doing and what they were gonna be doing with Black Panther was inspiring. It just felt like a great, an amazing time for Afrofuturism. Do you all know about Afrofuturism? Yeah. For me, Afrofuturism is extremely important because we get to, as black folks in this world, we get to speak through science fiction and magical surrealism. We get to speak about our stories told from our own mouths in the future, and what happens to us. In Black Panther you see us as kings and queens, and amazing stem heads with Shuri running the whole ... right? An amazing character. You get to see us in those worlds. Sometimes we’re depicted in very stereotypical, not that they’re not important roles, but we’re not monolithic. There’s so many things that we can do, and I think it’s through that story telling and through Afrofuturism that you get to see us, all of us, and you get to hear it from our mouths.

Christine Kakaire

Yeah, I think it was especially incredible to read about this kind of crossover between your project and Ryan Coogler’s project, Black Panther. I think once both of these projects hit the media sphere, this narrative came up about it being the era of Afrofuturism, or the year of Afrofuturism. I think it gives a different perspective to learn that you are all actually kind of hanging out together and working on these projects. Do you have a sense that this Afrofuturism perspective, or imagined future is something that’s kind of permeating in lots of different areas of, perhaps, African American society or even globally, the global African diaspora? Do you feel that?

Janelle Monáe

Yeah, I think Afrofuturism is a big global idea. I think people have already opened up the doors for Afrofuturism decades ago, from Sun Ra to so many... Space Is The Place, that film is one to check out. You have so many artists, Betty Davis, George Clinton, Parliament Funkadelic. You can go on, and on, and on. They were doing it. I just don’t think that there was a term that sounded as cool as Afrofuturism. But now, it’s all about marketing these days, I’m told. I think it’s a great thing. I think it’s so great, again, that we get to learn about each other. I know that I speak a lot about what it means to be black and what it means to me a woman. I think that we all gain when we learn, when people are able to walk in their truth. I just think that it’s always great when we can just celebrate our differences, and also understand our interconnectedness.

Christine Kakaire

Absolutely. Continuing on a little bit further with Afrofuturism, it’s a term that’s been applied to your work from the very beginning, because when the Metropolis EP was released, there was the music, but there was also this fully formed world that existed around it with Cindy Mayweather, this rebel android who falls in love with a man. The whole narrative that existed around it, where did that come from?

Janelle Monáe

Cindy Mayweather, this android, one, I have a great creative ... I have lots of great creative conversations in Wondaland. One of my, I call him my birthday twin, he’s December 2nd, I’m December 1st, he and I would sit and watch so many science fiction films. When I left New York I knew I wanted to become an independent artist. I knew that I wanted to contribute something unique to the music industry. I knew that I didn’t want to come and just create music that was just based off being famous. I had some shit I wanted to say. I was listening to Stevie Wonder, listening to David Bowie, listening to Lauryn Hill, listening to Erykah Badu, listening to Pink Floyd, listening to just a lot of different stuff when I got to Atlanta and I started to hang out and meet folks in Wondaland. I watched this film, Metropolis, Fritz Lang’s 1927 German expressionist film, or not German. Yeah. Silent film. I watched that. I usually fall asleep in silent movies, but for some reason I stayed up this day. Although there was no talking, obviously, it was so much that I heard and so much that I saw with the character of Maria, and the haves and the have nots. There was this one quote that I think inspired everything. It was like the mediator between, I might not be quoting it exactly, but, “The mediator between the mind and the hands is the heart.” I said, “I want to represent the heart.” I want to bring people together with music. I want to create a story, a character, a world where people see that it can be done. That’s what the Metropolis EP aimed to do. ArchAndroid continued the story on with Cindi, who is this android. She’s from a lower class, a wired part of town, and she is the one who bridges this gap through her music and through her heroism.

Janelle Monáe

That’s a word, right?

Christine Kakaire

It is.

Janelle Monáe

I told you I’m on a different time zone, so I’m kind of like this, but that started it. It was that quote.

Christine Kakaire

Where is Cindy now?

Janelle Monáe

She’s at the hotel relaxing, just chilling.

Christine Kakaire

OK.

Janelle Monáe

She was very much so involved in Dirty Computer, and really did help me get out these ideas. If I didn’t do the ... although I had the concept for Dirty Computer, around ArchAndroid, I needed to do ArchAndroid. I needed to do Electric Lady to get to Dirty Computer. There were just layers that needed to be peeled back. There was just ... I had to do some more living. I had to do some more living, and it was important that it was done in this order because I don’t think I probably would have been ready, like in 2007, to take on a project like this. I didn’t know enough. I hadn’t gone through enough. I had not felt convicted enough. I had not cried enough. I had not loved enough. I had not laughed enough. I had not been hurt enough. I had not been scared enough, fearful enough. I needed to go through all that shit to get here. [applause]

Christine Kakaire

Another question about the characters who inhabit your music world. Who is Mary?

Janelle Monáe

Blueberry Mary.

Christine Kakaire

Also, is it Mary Apple, as well?

Janelle Monáe

To be continued.

Christine Kakaire

OK.

Janelle Monáe

Blueberry Mary. I’ve a song called “Mushrooms And Roses.” It was on The ArchAndroid, which came out in the future 2010. It highlights a story around Blueberry Mary, who’s in this club called Mushrooms And Roses. I’m infatuated with her. Cindi’s infatuated with her. This is her first ... Mushrooms And Roses is the place where people go and they can be all the androids. They’re not working. They get to be crazy and free and all those things. She goes to Mushrooms and Roses, and she sees Blueberry Mary is that. This is the first time she’s really been attracted to her spirit. I mean, Cindi’s an android in this song, so it’s kind of like everybody’s pansexual in Metropolis. It’s just all about a vibe. It’s not about how you identify, because everybody identifies as so many different things. It’s a spectrum. She sees Blueberry Mary, and for the first time, she’s having feelings as she just has never felt before. That song is a exploration of that, and Blueberry Mary is the person who pulls out what’s been inside of Cindi, and what was kind of laying dormant, but it needed to be spruced up and watered for it to blossom. They have a connection. I think they may have hooked up that night. I think may or may not have. But, it was cool. It was really cool. It was a great experience, and she’s still a part of the ArchAndroid, Electric Lady series. But, her DNA is in Mary Apple. So, Dirty Computer is near future, ArchAndroid is 2719.

Christine Kakaire

OK.

Janelle Monáe

Yeah. So, what you see in Dirty Computer hasn’t even been born yet, really.

Christine Kakaire

OK. When I was reading about Mary, I thought it was really funny that it’s like Blueberry Mary and Mary Apple, this organic, delicious, edible character. I don’t know. Am I reading too much into it?

Janelle Monáe

I don’t know. Listen, art is meant to be discussed. Let’s discuss it.

Christine Kakaire

Alright. Alright. We can take that to the backstage. Where do you think your music projects will be heading to in the future? Do you already have an idea?

Janelle Monáe

Yeah, I have my next 12 albums lined up. I know exactly what I’m going to say, everything is going to be just fine. No. I don’t know what the fuck I’m doing. I’m trying to make decisions as I go, just like everybody else. But, I know I’m excited about it. I think that I’m a great space of just ... I know that I want to continue to connect in this way, like going to the shows. I mentioned earlier in doing our performances and hearing people sing the songs and the lyrics, and owning this music like it’s their music. Like, “This is for us. You’re actually just here as eye candy, Janelle. You got the costumes on, but this is our music,” and I love that. I do know I want to continue to give people that, and I want to be able to experience it with them. I want us to share in community as much as possible. That’s really making me feel good these days and feel like I’m not wasting my time. Just telling universal stories in unforgettable ways. There’s some film projects that I definitely want to do. There’s some people that I would love to work with, as well. Hopefully, schedules will align and that can happen. I definitely want to start a family, as well. Yeah, there’s so much and so little time. All this stuff actually ... I might change my mind when I get to the room. I don’t know. There’s so many great things that we can do, and that’s the great thing about life. I’m just keeping myself very open. I’m open.

Christine Kakaire

OK. I think we’ve got a limited amount of time left, but I wanted to ask you two questions as relate specifically to Dirty Computer. What’s your favorite moment from it? And, that can be a song or a visual still. Yeah, let’s start there. What’s your favorite moment?

Janelle Monáe

Well, first of all, it almost didn’t happen, so everything is just amazing at this point, because we pulled it off. It happened. Exactly. It almost didn’t happen. We almost did not have everything shot. I just want to give a shout out to everybody who worked on the emotion picture: Tessa Thompson, an incredible actress, a dear friend to me. Jayson Aaron, who played Che, just an incredible young up and coming talent. Look out for him. All the directors, Andrew and Chuck Lightning, and Lacey Duke and Emma. The producers, Wondaland Management. All these people ... Allen Ferguson, who has been with me since “Many Moons.” I know we were talking about “Many Moons” backstage. He shot the first emotion picture. It was just such a labor of love. Everybody was up long hours reshooting. I shot “Django Jane”... Let me tell you, we had a whole video for “Django Jane.” Couldn’t get some things turned in on time, like the special effects would not be done by the time it was going to be released, because it was going to be one of the first of two that came out in February. Do you know I had to shoot that video again two days before we released it?

Christine Kakaire

Yikes.

Janelle Monáe

It was crazy. Stuff like that makes me just appreciate it whole project. I think that the scene where Mary and Jane-57821 are walking down the hall before Jane goes to get her last Nevermind treatment. Nevermind is the fog that’s in there that really just helps prep the deletion of memories in Jane. Before she goes to her final treatment to be erased, they go down a hall together, and you just see them both trying to hold on to love and to hold on to her identity is. That was a moment. It was real, just very emotional. I had to fix my makeup so much, so many tears. It was a lot. It was heavy. Then I love the musical scoring of Dirty Computer a lot. It love it so much. Shout out to Nate “Rocket” Wonder, and Win, who’s a part of this amazing group called Twin Shadows. Check them out. She is an incredible producer. Nate and her got together and they created string arrangements of the songs. Then there’s a beach scene. I love the beach scene. Yeah, the music, in particular, on the beach scene how it complements this three people who just love each other and want to create a place that’s rooted in love. When you hear the strings juxtaposed to them out by the water, that moment is so epic. I think that’s one of my favorite moments, actually, in Dirty Computer. Yeah, it’s those strings on the beach scene.

Christine Kakaire

It’s taking you back.

Janelle Monáe

I already want to go on a vacation.

Christine Kakaire

I guess as a final question, what do you hope that people will take away from Dirty Computer as... I mean, I understand that when you release projects like this, it’s like pushing a baby bird out of the nest. It’s kind of got to survive on its own. But, if there’s one message that you would hope is transmitted to people through this project, what would it be?

Janelle Monáe

That we all owe love a responsibility. A responsibility, we have to fight for it. We have to protect it. It’s the glue that will keep us together as humanity. I don’t think we can win without it. I think that we lose everything without it. Yeah, I think we win with it, excuse me. I think we lose everything without it. It’s important that we just know that and maybe we can stay rooted in that and let that be our guide. Those of us who have felt marginalized or ostracized because of where you come from, who you love, what class you’re from, I pray that when they watch Dirty Computer and they listen to Dirty Computer, that they feel seen, they feel heard, they feel accepted, they feel valued. And, they feel celebrated to be their free-ass motherfucking selves. [applause]

Christine Kakaire

Actually, this is a question that I wanted to ask you earlier. Actually, two questions. I’ll start with dance and movement and how integral that is to your performance and to your aesthetic. I think for a lot of people, “Tightrope” would have been the first introduction to Janelle Monáe and to her talents. Can you talk a little bit about how dance interacts and interlocks with what you’re doing as an artist, and how it’s another mode of expression for you?

Janelle Monáe

Well, I started off moonwalking in the kitchen in my socks. I love dancing. I love Michael Jackson. I love Janet Jackson. I love James Brown. I love Prince’s dancing. I love David Bowie’s dancing. I love Tina on the bass in the Talking Heads, love how she dances. She moves her legs when she’s playing. I love Sister Rosetta Tharpe. I love Little Richard. I love jazz, tap, ballet. I love everything, and I feel like I’m a piece of everything. I like to create something that’s all my own whenever I’m on stage. I do two hours of performance every night, and it’s nonstop dancing. High energy. I feel like dancing is very therapeutic. I feel like dancing is a spiritual thing. I feel like dancing can cure a lot of negative thoughts that you might have. I feel like dance is transformative. I use it as a weapon to fight off patriarchy. [applause]

Christine Kakaire

I think that’s...

Janelle Monáe

... and sexism and toxic masculinity. Yeah. I use it for a lot of different things.

Christine Kakaire

OK. I think that’s a wonderful note to leave this discussion on. Please help me thanking Janelle Monáe for being here.

Janelle Monáe

Thank you. Thank you. [applause]