美国国家公共电台 NPR Frankie Cosmos Examines Fear, Fame And Womanhood

(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "BEING ALIVE")

FRANKIE COSMOS 1: (Singing) Seven, eight, nine - rest. Being alive - I see you in everything...

SCOTT SIMON, HOST:

Don't be fooled by the upbeat energy in the music of Frankie Cosmos. Those drums and guitars are paired with confusion, yearning 2 and heartbreak.

(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "BEING ALIVE")

FRANKIE COSMOS: ...(Singing) I'm collapsing 3 inwardly. Your name strikes a match in me...

SIMON: Greta Kline is behind that name, Frankie Cosmos. She's just released her third full-length album, "Vessel 4." She joins us now from our studios in New York. Thanks so much for being with us.

GRETA KLINE: Yeah. Thanks for having me.

SIMON: So who - what - how so is Frankie Cosmos? - a character, a stage name, nickname, persona?

KLINE: At this point, it's more, like, the band name actually. I could play as Frankie Cosmos, but I prefer to play with my three bandmates. And all together, we are Frankie Cosmos.

SIMON: I've read that Frankie Cosmos kind of came out of a reluctance 5 to be on stage.

KLINE: Yeah. I mean, I just liked the idea of having, like, a distance between my name and myself and the art. So I liked the idea of having a fake name that sounds maybe, like, more diva. And I also started it without really planning to perform live. I was just, like, making music for fun sort of on my computer.

(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "UR UP")

FRANKIE COSMOS: (Singing) I wonder if you're up. I'm America.

KLINE: I've always kept a diary and stuff. But I think writing songs provided a secret code almost of talking about my feelings, like, with myself.

SIMON: It's not secret when...

(LAUGHTER)

KLINE: Well, it still feels kind of secret in a weird 6 way because it's like, nobody ever will fully 7 understand I guess what I mean just because they're - everyone hears it through their own experience.

SIMON: Let's listen to some more of your music. This is a clip from "Apathy 8."

(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "APATHY")

FRANKIE COSMOS: (Singing) Looking around at 22, I'm so tired of myself around you.

KLINE: Sometimes when you care about something so much like I feel like I do about a lot of things - and I sometimes, like, wish that I had apathy just because it's like - it would be more relaxing or something.

SIMON: Is it that strenuous 9 to be a music star for you?

KLINE: I feel very, like, exposed onstage. I feel like that part of it is very strenuous. It's made harder by the fact that I - it's very close to me and I care about it a lot.

SIMON: To state the obvious and get it out of the way, you had an example close by of what it's like to be well-known and performing, right?

KLINE: Yes. Both my parents are famous or have been famous at one point.

SIMON: Kevin Kline and Phoebe Cates.

KLINE: Yeah. So it's very nice for me to have that resource of, like, having parents that understand what I'm going through from two very different perspectives because my dad is still working and in the business. And my mom is - runs a store now. So it's good to have a little bit of both.

SIMON: Let's listen to another one of your songs. This one is "Accommodate."

(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "ACCOMODATE")

FRANKIE COSMOS: (Singing) My body is a burden. I'm always yearning to be less accommodating, to say loud how I'm feeling.

SIMON: So where's this song come from?

KLINE: I mean, it comes from just my personal experience of being a woman and what that means to the rest of the world and questioning sort of, how would it be different if I were in a different body?

SIMON: And you wrote these lyrics 10, too - my body is a burden.

KLINE: It's true (laughter). I don't know how to explain it. I think probably a lot of people can relate to that sentiment but that often being stuck in a female body is restrictive in a lot of ways. It sort of defines the way that everybody's going to see what I'm making and what I'm doing and how they can treat me. I don't know. It's very hard with Frankie Cosmos. I've sort of - you know, it started off as just me alone in my room. And it's slowly grown into something much bigger than that and many people, like, helping 11 make it happen. And so it's been very hard to maintain the feeling that it's mine and that I, like, deserve to claim it as mine. And I often think if I were a man, that it would be easier to say, oh, yeah. This is my project, and I own that.

SIMON: Greta Kline, who makes music as Frankie Cosmos and with Frankie Cosmos - her album "Vessel" released this week - thanks so much for being with us.

KLINE: Yeah. Thanks for having me.

(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "I'M FRIED")

FRANKIE COSMOS: (Singing) Trying to keep it pure like it was before. So maybe I won't be yours in fully the same way.