Lourds: Absolutely, absolutely. I was giving my own endings to Bach concertos, and I remember solos where I would change the ending and the conductor would turn around, still conducting, and say, "What are you doing?!" And the audience had no clue, but I knew it wasn't Bach any more, it was Lourds. And I enjoyed it, because now, I focused all my passion against classical, against regimentation, and against structure, and against the establishment. And, eventually, I just quit violin altogether, and took up the French horn to be a rebel. [Laughs.]

MA: Just to break away for a while?

Lourds: Just to break away. It was like something I would never think of doing. no one was playing it. I said, "All right, I'll learn that," and they were like, "What, are you kidding me, you play the violin." The whole school was shouting, "What are you doing?!" And I said, "What do you mean? I'm doing what I want to do."

MA: What a concept!

Lourds: So I just took up French horn just to be pretty much random and funny, and to see whether or not I could pick up anything new, and I did. I just stopped playing violin—and then I discovered the electric violin and then a whole new world opened up. You can distort it, make it sound like a guitar, wank and wail, just like any guitar player, and I can play tasty little licks and pretty little classical things that I remember from when I was a kid. I don't even press really hard with my bow to get that distorted sound, I can get that distorted sound by kicking in the distortion pedal. You know, it's really, really great, it opened up a whole new world. But I always was in rock 'n' roll bands in high school. I didn't know if I always necessarily could see that as a living.

MA: Also music, it's a vocation, whether or not you do it for money or not, it's incidental.

Lourds: Yeah, I say "as a living," in quotes because, right now, I'm still struggling. I didn't know it would necessarily be my entire life's work. The reason is I think that truthfully I got into music and rock 'n' roll to rebel. I was valedictorian of my high school, I was a total nerd. I was expected to be a doctor, I was expected to be the "Most likely to succeed." It was definitely in a professional field. And I was like, "You know, how do you know, like that's where I have to go?" And whenever people start putting me in a box, I just want to break away.

MA: Let me ask you, while you were rebelling and breaking out, tell me a little bit about your background and your family, where you grew up, and whether they encouraged you.

Lourds: Well, see, that was the thing: Music was always a hobby, and always part of the Renaissance girl, part of making a well-rounded daughter to get into Harvard. It was not meant to be a total focus. But at the same time, if you're gonna get me out on stage at four, five, six, seven, then now it's a part of me. I've been performing in front of thousands of people since I was a kid.

MA: So, when did it go from you were really little, the cute little girl with the violin, "Oh, look at my daughter!" to "Oh, my God, there's my daughter wagging her tongue. . . "

Lourds: I think my mom always thought it was cute, and my mom pretty much raised me. My dad brought me to the KISS concert, but they were separated. My mom pretty much raised me alone for my childhood. So, my mom, she kind of always accepted it, because she thought, "This is really cute, it's fine, it's fun. She still well-rounded, and she's still playing her instrument, and it's all good." I'm taking up the French horn, great, another instrument! It was all fun, and I put it all in my yearbook. That's a funny story.

MA: Oooh, an anecdote, an anecdote!

Lourds: This is really funny. No one knows this story, but it's the truth. This is a crazy story, but I was a nerd, and I was president of all the clubs. A classic overachiever. And I worked really hard to do anything, and I accomplished a lot as a little high-school girl. So, I have to say, when the time came for the yearbook, where we actually had to submit everything that you're in, the ups and the downs, I had a list of extra-curricular activities that was so heavy and so long that my goal got cut off. But the ironic thing was it was too bad it got cut off, because my goal said, "To be a rock star." But it got cut off because my list of extra-curriculars was so massive, it was like, chess club, honor society, dorky things like that, things like literary club, newspaper editor.

MA: But that's what you did.

Lourds: "To be a rock star" was a joke, even for me. It was like. "Oh, ha, ha, to be a rock star, that's funny!" It was so off to left field, I mean who would think that? Because in my head I still wasn't absorbing the fact that my creative happiness comes from music, and I was still trying to find myself. And then, as the year progressed, and I found out in my the senior year of high school, I started figuring out it really wasn't a joke, and not that I wanted to be a rock star or be commercial, I just wanted to do music as my life's work. You know what, I got a positive reaction, totally, I really love music, I really wanted to do this. This is what makes me happy, this is what keeps me from being sad. And, as the years progressed, I think I realize more and more that I'm not meant to be the 9-to-5 girl. Although I love healing people, and I'd love to be a doctor, and I love the concept of it, it's not really for me. The most I can do is just though song. I like the concept of teaching, as well, and maybe one day I can do that, as well.

MA: I think you'd make an excellent music teacher, especially for kids.

Lourds: Yeah, some day I might be able to do that, or do something with kids at some point. But it's like, I'll always have that need to write and to perform, and mostly to write music—I mean performing is cool, in and of itself, but to write music it's such a miracle thing, like when you have nothing but sadness, and then the next thing you know, you have a song. That's just the most amazing and beautiful thing to me. As the years progressed, it just really hit me that it wasn't a joke, and I think that somehow, some way, it became no longer the hobby and the extra-curricular thing and part of the Renaissance girl, and it became more something I want to do. And, in that way, my mom really supports me, because she sort of gave that to me, since I was a little girl. I was taught, since I was a little girl, and I was playing, since I was a little girl, and my mom gave that to me. So she can't blame me, she gave that to me. My brother, my sister, they're musical, but they're not doing music, you know? If you're going to do that to your child at such a young age, then you have to understand that there might be a chance that it's going to grow into something huge, and maybe perhaps I'll start thinking this is where I should go. This is what gives me my greatest joy.

Next: "I love the fact that I'm underground. I have this cool little cult thing going on."