Love: Yeah, but I wrote so much about my boyfriend. I wrote so much about boys and love and what I felt at the time. As far as the other thing goes, if it's gonna fix you to think that, you can apply that. And there is some of that. But you know what? There's a whole lot of not that. This is not [Neil Young's] "Sleeps With Angels." OK? That boy got a lot of songs written about him. What I have to say about that, I say to my shrink, basically. And what I have to say about that creatively, you're gonna read in whatever you like. And that's OK. That's what art is supposed to be. You can go ahead and do that. It's so subconscious, I don't know what's functioning on what level. I got given this. I got given this ability to use words well. And that is my gift that I got and I got given it on this record. And I got directed and I got help from mystical sources and literal sources. You can do whatever you want, project whatever you want. But I'm not telling.

ATN: You end that song with the line: "You want a part of me/well, I'm not selling cheap/no, I'm not selling cheap." Who's that directed to?

Love: Well, for our first thought -- "You want a part of me/well, now I'm selling cheap" -- but then I changed my mind.I don't know. When I was singing it, I was singing it over a playback. It's just defiant. It's the truth. I don't know why I thought of it in the converse because it's the truth. I don't want to do anything for money. And I won't do anything for just plain vanity, except once in a while when I like to pose on the cover of Us and try and look like Pamela Anderson. [laughs] But that's just me when I'm bored, being vain. I won't do art for money or vanity, ever. So, I'm not gonna sell cheap.

ATN: In some of the songs, you describe Hollywood and showbiz as --

Love: Did you just say "showbiz," Michael?

ATN: Yeah.

Love: All right. The business of show.

ATN: You describe Hollywood and showbiz as robbing girls' souls, feeding on innocence, cynicism, selling out and being sold out. Has that been your experience or has that been what you've seen -- observed -- of the biz?

Love: Well, I have a lot of conflicts about it myself. I talk a big game about other people's conflicts about selling out, but I'm not a pampered, upper-middle class girl. I come here from a really tough, hard tradition. I enter the mainstream at a specific point that most people haven't. The old tough broads did. Joan Crawford did. That's why I like a good diva. I like a good Demi Moore. I like a good sleepover with a Demi Moore because they're divas that come from trailer parks. Not that I really come from a trailer park, but I think it's good to understand where you come from, no matter how much it's damaged you or damaged your feelings about art.

I'm probably protected to some degree by my 'weird-Marxist-punk-having-to-live-through-that-scene-of-junkies-and-hustler s-and-Tim-Yohannans-and-punkers' upbringing. Because it guides me. I don't wanna go back there and I won't, but there were people with a lot of integrity and a lot of soul and a lot of 'I'm not giving in.' That was just their informed knowledge, that's their tradition, that's what gets handed down. But when you're a girl coming up through punk-rock or a subcultural scene, you get all this received wisdom that's really meant for males. It's truly, I believe, a male rite of passage. The whole Ian MacKaye, Steve Albini kind of conundrum is a male rite of passage. It's almost like "I'll achieve my manhood by being in a band and not selling out." There's not a lot of room for a kind of fluid ambition. Because of people like Madonna or whatever, I personally get put in the shadow of 'Oh, she's rapacious, she's ruthless in her ambition," which is true on the level of, like, I want to erect the best building. But goddamn if I'm gonna build it cheaply.

ATN: What's wrong with being ambitious?

Love: Not a damn thing. It's American.

ATN: And it seems like any songwriter, for example, wants their stuff to be heard. They don't want to play it for a living room. They want the world to hear their stuff.

Love: It's a futile ... it's almost a stupid conversation at this point. And it's a conversation you're gonna have with every young musician that walks in the room that's coming from a certain place. You might not have it with somebody put together by a record company or some Hootie that's just so damn happy to be here. But anybody that comes from a history is gonna have this problem. They're gonna have this problem. They're gonna be whoever ... your Scorpio. And they're gonna go in the room and they're gonna say, "We don't wanna write the hook 'cause that's selling out. And we're not gonna try for the hook." And they're just conflicted, there's a tension there. I more looked at directors. I looked at somebody like Quentin Tarentino. He built a building, he didn't compromise his vision. It's great. We all love it. We all understand it. It operates on many, many, many levels and it's organic and real. Do you know what I mean? Or look at Milos. And I can look at songwriters and see that too. I can look at Neil Young and whatever, but commercially, I don't know.