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BiTS: Where did the music come from? Where does the love of music come from?

AA: My mother especially, is very obsessed with music, and so is my father. They broke
up when I was very small, when I was about two or three and my mum then found my

step-father, who also loves music. My mum would play a lot of soul, Motown and a bit
of reggae when I was growing up, and my father, especially when I would go and visit
him, he plays
nothing but old
blues, jazz and soul

music. He really is
obsessed. My mum
was playing Mar-

vin Gaye to me
when I was still in
the womb, using
her Sony Walkman

headphones, or
whatever she had
at the time, you

know [chuckles].
Headphones of
some kind attached
to a boombox, I
imagine.

She was playing
Marvin Gaye to me

when I was still in
the womb. My
father, when I go and see him, was constantly playing stars from the 40s, right through
to the 70s, mostly, and it was through him that I became obsessed with blues and soul,

predominantly.

BiTS: Did you sort of sing along with the records when you were a kid? Is that what
happened?

AA: Absolutely. I learned the vast majority of Aretha Franklin's hits note for note by
the time I was a teenager, I think.

BiTS: Wow. Okay.

AA: I would soak them up and learn how to sing them all exactly how they were, and
that’s definitely one of the things that taught me contemporary singing the most I

think, is learning the masters note for note [laughs]. Just like an art student learns
how to draw by sketching the Michelangelo images. I would listen to the classics and
learn them note for note.