Anika Moa’s latest album Love In Motion has solidified her reputation as one of the country’s best singer-songwriters. She’s now making her way up country on tour and talks to Paula Yeoman.

Your last album In Swings The Tide was such a huge success – you toured it extensively. How did you get yourself into a place where you could start focusing on writing for the new album?
After I released In Swings The Tide I toured for three years and when I wasn’t touring, in my downtime, I was usually visiting my wife. And because she’s a performer I was going out on tour with her. So that’s when I was writing.

When I write, I listen to certain albums. That’s how I start my process – it starts the brain working and I start thinking about how I want my music to sound. So the songs are usually influenced by what I’m listening to, which for this album was a lot of rock music, lots of indie punk, lots of Gossip and lots – LOTS – of Ladyhawke.

One of the things I like about the album is that you can really hear the instruments – you can hear the guitar; you can hear the drums…
Yeah, we recorded it at Roundhead Studios. Before we started I told Andre Upston, my co-producer, that I wanted it to sound dirty and gritty and that I wanted to hear that band. We recorded everything to tape, which is what they did in the old days and then we put it back to Pro Tools. It makes it sound more nostalgic.

Love features prominently in the album… the word pops up in four of the song titles and in the album title…
I tried to get the word in every single song title, but people were like, ‘You’re ridiculous; don’t be such an egg,’ so I had to stop.
A lot of the songs were looking back at things that happened in my life and yeah lots of them are love songs, but they’re also songs about people I love to hate and hate to love – people that really annoyed me, and still annoy me. There are all those branches of love. It can’t just be solely about loving one person.

You’re a very confessional writer. Do you ever worry that you’re giving too much of yourself away in your music?
I used to think that – when I was a homophobic in the closet lesbian. I used to be like ‘Oh no people will know I’m gay.’ But I’ve been in the industry for 12 years and I’ve learnt how to be smart and I’ve learnt how to be honest. I’ve had people come up to me after shows and say ‘You’re real, you talk about how insecure you are, but then you also talk about how amazing you are.’ And that’s an honest human being from New Zealand.

Does it feel like the whole of New Zealand thinks they know you?
Yes, it’s boring. Everyone has an opinion of you and thinks they know what sort of person you are. But all those rumours and myths are dispelled if you come to my live show. Some of it’s me acting and bullshitting my way through, but most of it is me just being myself.

You gave up a career in New York to come home and now you’ve moved back from Melbourne. You must love New Zealand?
I love New York – don’t get me wrong. But I was 18 when I lived there and you can’t drink in a bar over there when you’re 18. I had to drink by myself at home. I’ve lived in London, New York and Australia and I’ve been to so many places but it’s always good to come home. Even though this country is small and all of a sudden you find yourself in the social pages and people are talking about you, it doesn’t matter because no one cares.

So you’re going out on tour and obviously you’ll be playing all the songs from your new album but what about the old ones – do you ever get sick of playing them?
After a year of playing the songs from each album I get so over them. People are like, ‘Play that song.’ and I’m like ‘Not gonna!’ and they get really pissed off. But I try my hardest to give people what they want.

And after the tour – what’s next?
I’m going to do another tour after this one, later in the year. Then I’m going to take a hiatus. Love In Motion is the last album Anika Moa will make and then I’m going to start a new band with a few friends of mine. I want to settle down and have babies and focus on living a full life with my family.
It [music] is not the be all and end all – it’s never the be all and end all. And I do choose Shortland Street over going to a gig. I’m a true blue Kiwi.