Your performances are intense and emotional – how do you wind down after each show?
Usually talking non-stop and chatting when I’m signing CDs with the audience after the show – complete disintegration! After that, maybe hanging with the band and having a drink of red wine or doing what I’m doing now – answering questions at 2:00 am in the morning because I haven’t wound down yet!

You’ve performed alongside icons like Patti Smith and Sean Lennon, but who has been the one person that stood out as one you were thrilled to meet?
Well I’ve been thrilled to meet Nick Cave a few times but always go silent and can’t say a word! Other than that, I loved meeting Judi Dench and Bob Hoskins when I worked on a film a few years ago, Tim Robbins and Todd Rudngren and Yoko Ono were also good fun to meet.

What would you consider to be your career highlight so far?
Eeek let’s see, several moments … I was so delighted to be on Jools Holland’s BBC iconic music show, playing Royal Albert Hall, headlining Royal Festival Hall London, creating music and performing a one-woman show for the Royal Shakespeare Company The Rape of Lucrece by Shakespeare, which received a Herald Angel Award at the Edinburgh International Festival.

Let’s take it back to the beginning – you were born in London to a French mother and Irish father. What was your childhood like?
Bohemian parents, a large house in a small village, knew no neighbours, an isolated upbringing full of eclectic music on the record player. Doing piano and ballet lessons, hanging with lots of cats, climbing trees, supportive father, mother who painted, lovely sister to hang out with. I was usually dancing around the living room or drawing pictures late into the night.

When did you first recognise your musical talents?
Halfway through my architecture degree! I was performing in university shows and we did a great show called Jacques Brel is Alive and Well and Living in Paris. I just adored singing his dramatic, emotional songs. I’d also been brought up on this music by my French maman. I felt alive and moved by his songs when I sang them, and loved that you could be someone else too – I wasn’t too mad about reality of life!

Can you remember the first time you performed in front of anybody?
I had performed in school plays when I was little, I think I did The Wizard of Oz two times – once as Bad Witch, then Good Witch – and I’m still obsessed by that film. I also did Oliver and later on in secondary school Anything Goes and Death of a Salesman. I felt lucky I had the opportunity to perform in school plays – I’m not sure if I would have become a performer if I hadn’t had those opportunities in school and university. Someone from school came to a show of mine and said, “You were such a shy thing, where did this person come from?!” I’d forgotten that, but I think that’s why lots of performers want to be something else on stage.

You studied fine art painting before graduating from architecture and eventually becoming an actress and singer. With hindsight, is there anything you would have done differently – or did all of these experiences make you a better performer?
It’s difficult to say, there were a few different roads and sometimes I wish I’d started performing earlier, but then again being an architect gave me a work ethic from university and maybe it was better to have lived a little before being thrown into the unstable world of acting. I felt I had something else to fall back on. I think they were all creative careers but singing is the most emotional and immediate and the painting was people-watching and the architecture had aspects that was about creating an atmosphere, so I still use that part of me in performing and setting up a show. Also it’s great to perform and sing whilst staring at the interior of amazing buildings like the Sydney Opera House, beautiful churches or The Famous Spiegeltent, tent of mirrors.

What’s one of your fondest memories from running away to join The Famous Spiegeltent circus?
It was such an incredible experience, I’ll never forget when I first stepped into that magical building! You feel like you’ve stepped back in time to another world – velvet awning, mirrored tent, stained-glass windows with little timber booths. I think I may have shed a tear when I first performed there as it was the most beautiful venue I’d ever been in. I was lucky to be asked to tour with it with my own show and was asked to perform in a new show they were putting together, La Clique. The next moment, we were off to Australia, Canada, the UK and the US. It was a dream come true, you never knew which city would greet you after you came off stage and left the building. During my La Clique/La Soiree years I met some incredible characters, world-class gymnasts, sword swallowers, contortionists, magicians – just bonkers and brilliant!

You’ll be performing in Brisbane at the end of the month, what’s on your list of things to do, see or consume while you’re here?
Well I remember last time I went, there was fantastic food at the Brisbane Powerhouse where I’m performing, so I’ll definitely try that, I remember it was close to the river which I wanted to take a boat ride on, so will try that, and maybe then head with my sketch pad to the Botanic Gardens for a walk and do some drawing!

What can the audience expect from your new show, Changeling?
I’m drawn to storytelling in songs where you can become a different character in the song. The show is a mixture of theatre, ballads and rock, singing songs from Nick Cave, Tom Waits, Radiohead, Jacques Brel and Bob Dylan. The show has been likened to an emotional rollercoaster where one doesn’t know what will happen from one moment to the next and that they felt there were 20 different people on stage! I enter quite enigmatically and by the end look absolutely wrecked … but joyfully so! The stage is decorated with a rabbit light, old speaking suitcase and vintage dress that spin mid-air, just adding bit of fantasy. I like to be quite like a chameleon on stage and have very different songs, so the show is full of variety to reveal the light and the dark side, the vulnerable, the more male side, fun madness – essentially showing all the different aspects of yourself – soft, harsh, funny, sad. The line that sums up the show in a way comes from Leonard Cohen: “There is a crack in everything, that’s how the light gets in.”

Do you have a personal favourite track from the record?
I love ‘Ship Song’ by Nick Cave and also ‘True Love Waits’ by Radiohead.

You’re renowned for your incredible interpretations of well-known songs – can you let us in on the tracks that are still on your ‘to-do’ list?
Leonard Cohen’s ‘Alexander Leaving’ and ‘Take this Waltz’, Arcade Fire’s ‘The Suburbs’ and ‘My Body is a Cage’, and Nick Cave’s ‘Darker With The Day’.

What’s your idea of complete happiness?
Opposing ones: having an absolute break when I come off tour, and being in the middle of the madness during a show – completely present on-stage singing a favourite song. Lastly, being with friends and family having a good laugh!

What inspires you?
Interesting people, brilliant films by Billy Wilder and Hitchcock, old movie stars Ava Gardner, musicians David Bowie, Bob Dylan, Nick Cave and PJ Harvey. Art by Klimt and Matisse, theatre shows like Slava’s SnowShow and by Theatre de Complicite, circus performers. And then separate to inspiring work, generally unique individuals, quirkiness, nice people, people who are thoughtful and giving – I like to be around them more!