You Can Write A HIT In 40 Minutes... Here Is How | Sia

Some people on the red carpet, I was just like, winning an award doesn't mean shit. We write these songs in like 40 minutes and then we just send them to somebody and then we never really refer back to them ever again. I'm a bad actor. I realize now that I've had to try and make music videos.

Need motivation? Watch a top 10 with Believe Nation. What's up, it's Evan. My one word is believe and I believe in you. I believe you have an amazing gift inside you that I want to see explode out onto the world. Get your motivation to a 10 and get you believing in you. Grab a snack and chew on today's lessons from a woman who went from starting her career in a local acid jazz band in Adelaide, Australia, and having her boyfriend die in a car accident, to having a mainstream music career with 9 Grammy Awards and multiple number 1 hit songs. She's Sia, and here's my take on her top 10 rules of success. Enjoy! All right, let's kick things off with rule number 1: Define success for yourself.

I don't care if I win or not. I don't care. But it's also like, it's— I mean, it's nice, but it's fully, it's fully whatever, man. You know, I was saying to some people in there on the red carpet, I was just like, winning an award doesn't mean You know, like, not fucking up a relationship means something. Not cheating or like getting shit-faced and like punching your friend. Like, those sorts of things. Not doing that is meaningful. But getting an award is like weird. It's weird. Um, it's not really a measure of success in my life.

Rule number 2: Ignore the critics.

Reading all the reviews, everyone—

Really?

I don't read reviews. I don't read them. I don't even read the good ones because I get coelked because I met Chrissy Hynde once at Top of the Pops, like about 8 years ago, when I had— once I had a hit that was called Taken for Granted when I was an urban artist. And she said to me, whatever you do, don't read reviews or articles about you. Yeah, she said if you believe the good, you'll believe the bad, and there will be bad. So I just thought that's a good point, and she's right. Every time I've accidentally read one, I felt like—

Rule number 3: Create greatness.

So that we might see her creative process at work, Sia took us downstairs for a session with pianist and collaborator Chris Braid. As we watched and listened, Sia began to fashion a pop melody right there on the spot.

So then that's all we would do.

That was good.

That was mental. Can we have a copy of that? Nice work. And then have like Rihanna cut it next week.

How fast do the words come to you? How much do you tweak them after you write them?

Oh, I don't tweak them at all really. Don't you? I can make any word fit. I'm gonna live like someone who doesn't exist. Like chandelier and exist. So if you bend them in certain ways—

A hook, a distinctive word, the repetition of a strong concept. It's how these two came up with Britney's hit Perfume.

Oh, I don't even know if I know the words. Here's the thing, you know, we write these songs in like 40 minutes and then we just send them to somebody and then we never really refer back to them ever again.

Sia has spent the last few years becoming one of pop's most successful songwriters. Her resume is a Who's Huge of music superstars. Rihanna's Diamonds, Flo Rida's Wild Ones, DJ David Guetta's Titanium. How long did it take you to write Titanium?

It was like around 40 minutes, I think, and then maybe half an hour to record the vocals.

That's amazing.

Rule number 4: Have the right intentions.

I don't reckon you have to be beautiful to succeed in this industry, like beautiful looking. I think your intention has to be in the right place. Scott from Nashville says, "What's the message behind the video for Alive?" Oh, no message. Just was like thinking, what's another great thing I can do for like the little kids that watch videos and like something that's not hypersexual and that's kind of strong and shows strength and discipline. And what I liked about making the videos with Maddie was that it showed little kids new ways to express themselves that weren't already established. It just sort of felt like it's free to be a weirdo, you know, and I liked that. And so in this time, I wanted to do more representing of like young girls as strong and disciplined, and that was really my— when I found her online, that was really my impetus, was to just share more images of strong girls. That was kind of it. I'm going to do strong boys too. Coming soon.

Rule number 5 is play to your strengths.

I'm a bad actor. I realize now that I've had to try and make music videos. Directing is much easier. It's way fun. It's super challenging, and I really enjoy it. But yeah, acting I'm bad at. I feel like I'm pretty good director, not great, but pretty good. I think sometimes I come up with a good idea, and I mean, the Breathe Me one I thought was a good idea, the 2,500 Polaroids, um, like a flip book. I think that was a good idea. I've got some more good ideas that I need to make but that I don't actually have time or energy to make yet. So now I'm letting other people make my music videos because I've found people who I trust.

Rule number 6, my personal favorite: never complain.

We were talking a little bit earlier on about when this record's coming out. First of all, we should say it's called Some People Have Real Problems.

Yeah.

Anybody in particular that that refers to?

Well, I was just saying that, you know, like, I'm pretty privileged and I have to just try and make sure that I'm responsible and that I make sure that I don't like start complaining about things like rich people's problems, like, you know, the cleaner missed a spot.

Luxury problems, yeah, as we like to call them, that sort of thing.

Because, you know, there are people who don't have any legs or, or, you know, or, you know, whatever, you know, they don't have any food.

Of course. And so you were just relating to the fact that you're very lucky.

Like, we were complaining during the— any of the recording process, if anyone would complain, the running gag was, yeah, well, some people have real problems.

Exactly. We're in a studio making music.

Yeah.

Rule number 7: don't care what people think. In the press, you're compared to a lot of female artists.

Oh yeah, is there a list? Did you make a list? I can tell you who I know that I've always been compared to.

Yeah, Natalie Portman and people like that, and also some other.

Tell me who else, anyone else?

I'm always flattered. Lauren Hill, I also heard.

Oh, that's nice, I love her voice. She's one of my favorite voices, so that's flattering.

Do you see that as a compliment that you're compared with, or maybe you want to be your own personality?

I don't care, I don't care about what people think about me out there unless they think I'm mean or something, but I don't care if they think I'm like someone else because I know I'm not, I'm a total weirdo. I'm not selling a dream. I'm not selling fame like it's some sort of fantastic thing. I'm just trying to sell music and get on with my real life. And I'm always flattered when people compare me to other pop stars because they've made loads of money. And hopefully that means so will I.

Rule number 8: Understand your clients. Is that also the case when you, for example, write for other artists like Christina Aguilera?

Yeah, channeling. Well, I do it like an interview with them first, like a therapy sesh. So for an hour or so, I— well, in her case, I was like, is there anything that's upsetting you? Because they asked me for ballads. So I was like, is there anything— are you okay? Is there anything that's upsetting you at all? And I was like, um, you know, can you tell me a little bit about what's happening right now in your life? And so she did, and so we wrote songs. About that. So she went and fed Max, and then I would start a skeleton based on what she'd said, and she would come back, like, shift things around or say, I don't like that word, I like this word, or how about this phrase, or what about this melody if I do this here. And we build it around that sort of therapy sesh. So I try and channel them when I'm doing the songwriting.

Rule number 9: take care of yourself.

Years ago, when Sia was Maddie's age, family friend Colin Hay from the Aussie band Men at Work introduced her to Stevie Wonder.

He said, "I hope you're happy and successful in everything you do." Are you? Yeah.

Can you believe it?

I do have— I do spend a lot of time, like, pinching myself. I have to say, it's been pretty amazing. I might cry. It's been really amazing. The last couple of years have just been— since I made the decision to just take care of my own sanity and serenity and stuff, my life's just improved so much. And I'm honestly surprised that things are working out so well for me.

And rule number 10, the last one before the bonus clips, is perform amazingly.

Shine bright like diamond, shine bright like diamond! Wow yeah, shine bright like diamond, shine bright like diamond! Shine bright like diamond— oh my god yes, it really did work! With The Shade you think you're right? You thought that I was dead but now look at me and tell me if this isn't proof enough... That's not true though, no way man! No one can see through these eyes of mine because they don't have any light inside them anymore. And when we first met, there were tears flowing down our cheeks as soon as we touched hands for real again after 2 years apart from each other. Yeah, so many memories to share together once more; let us make up forever. Oh wow, he said okay too?! He agreed!

Yes sir!

We'll do just fine without him anyway. So what about his family then?

His parents or siblings?

They must be worried sick over here by himself alone out in space somewhere.

Now I've got some special Sia bonus clips for you, but before that, my question of the day relates to rule number 6: never complain. I want to know, the people in your life, what is the number one complaint that they have? Leave it down in the comments below. I'm really curious to find out. Thank you guys so much for watching. I believe in you. I hope you continue to believe in yourself and whatever Your one word is: much love. I'll see you soon and enjoy the bonus clips.

Even with all your success, why do you still shy away from the limelight, from fame? Well, it's unpleasant, you know, if it makes me feel hunted or I don't know, it's just like my friends that were with me the other day when the paps were at the airport and and it was like they all got diarrhea, and I had to explain that it was like you go into fight or flight, where it's like you're prey and they're the predator and you're being hunted. And it's— I mean, you know, would you like to spend your life feeling like prey? Probably not. So yeah, that's really all it is. It's just like wanting to have a regular life, just like a regular person, and still be able to make music and sing and stuff, but without having to sacrifice just having a regular life. When my dad lived at home, he was there until I was about 10 or 11, and he was a musician. He bought me a cassette player and what I used to do with it is I used to just record portions of songs, so like I liked that bit on The Doors' record that goes— So what I would do is I would just take that part and I would make a 30-minute cassette with just that part of the song on it. And then I remember another song I did it with was Chrissy Hynde, don't get me wrong, that bit, which I still can't do. She can get every note, but I can't do that.

The attention that you were getting after the last album when Six Feet Under went and put that song at the end of the series, and all of a sudden from not being known here in the States, everybody's like, who's, who's that girl? Who's, who sang that song? A nice, nice bit of attention, right? The album finally came out in the States because until then the last one hadn't even come out here. Yeah, I often say that that resuscitated my career, which is, you know, kind of ironic when I was flopping, but everybody died in the TV show. Yeah, you were resuscitated.

Yes, yes, I was.

So I thought it was funny. So I'm imagining that that gave you a profile that, you know, up until then here in the States you could have only dreamed of.

Yeah, totally. It was amazing. It was magic pants because I was considering going into like dog, like rescuing or making jewelry. Yeah, like squeezing out pups, you know, that sort of thing. Like just, you know, settling down. Right, exactly. And so, um, but you got the opportunity to make another record. I did. And also I realized you don't actually need to be successful to make music and put out music these days because record companies are kind of becoming obsolete.

Raise your standard.

Apple at the core Its core value is that we believe that people with passion can change the world for the better.

Not one drop of my self-worth depends on your acceptance of me. I don't ever give up. I'd have to be dead or completely incapacitated.

Hey, Believe Nation, if you want to see my all-time favorite top 10 rules of success, I have a very special secret video for you. These are the individual clips that I have personally learned the most from and applied to my life and my business. Check the link in the description for details.