I've built a solid career there, but America's ten times the size. Now that we're onto the third record, I feel like the stars have aligned and American audiences are embracing my music even more.
Sometimes my boyfriend would write the lyrics and I would write the melody, and other times I would start from scratch. Or sometimes I would take a local poem and put that to music.
Although they can do it all the time, you know, they're far better than me, on a musically, on a theoretical music level. You know, they're out of my league.
I struggled to keep one foot in music and one in academia. I had worked on my Ph.D. for three years full time before I realized Bad Religion could be a legitimate career.
I'm working on my music a lot, like folk singing, guitar. It's sort of rocky, folky, alty, angsty. I'm putting a lot of energy into that. I write pretty much all the time.
I've learned how much of an impact that music has on people. I get messages all the time from people telling me what my music means to them and what it has done to them.
I listened to the rock music of that time, but as you know and can easily hear: my music of that era had nothing to do with the common music of this era. I was experimenting, I was searching for something new.
Those albums are so important to me because, for the first time, I was making my own music, paying for it, finding strengths in it, and going through the process of finding the right music for the record.
For a long time, I was shy about recording gospel music, because I didn't necessarily want to show the inside of my soul, Milsap revealed. But now, the spiritual side of me is really shining through.
I think, honestly, that a lot of people think I'm sad and dark all the time, because of the music I have made. But there's a huge part of my personality that's really energetic, outgoing and goofy.
I run with music all the time. I cannot run without my iPod. I have everything. Teddy Pendergrass. Luther Van Dross. Michael Jackson. Outkast. If an Usher song comes on and it's fast, I go fast.
Even if I wasn't in music, even if my father was a carpenter, some guy in Jamaica would go 'You're just like Bob. You're just like your father.' That happens in Jamaica all the time.
I'm always in bed by 11 or 12 and people laugh all the time - they want me to hang out until two in the morning, but n-n-no, I need my nine hours.
My salary situation at 'Morning Joe' wasn't right. I made five attempts to fix it, then realized I'd made the same mistake every time: I apologised for asking.
The first information I consume in the morning is probably 'The New York Times' and then my Twitter feed. I think Twitter is a really fascinating, easy way to stay on top of what stories are out there.
In order to drill into young men the need to stay alert and stay alive, I used to punish offenders with my fists, boots and rifle butt, and with stockade time.
My mother tells me of when I was 10 or 11 and I'd wear really tight, short skirts and crop tops. All the local men would wolf whistle and stop and stare, but I didn't realise why at the time.
One of the things that first attracted me to chess is that it brings you into contact with intelligent, civilized people - men of the stature of Garry Kasparov, the former world champion, who was my part-time coach.
I was serious about ballet for a long time, but my mom got me into tap and jazz and modern and hip-hop, and I was one of those over-lessoned children.
When I got into junior high school, that's when my mom let me dress how I wanted to dress. Up to that point I wore suits to school all the time.
My first marriage was very traditional, in the church, and then we left the church and went to the reception hall. So this time, I'd like to go fairy tale all the way.
