Where did you grow up ? Was music already an important thing when you were a child ?
Anne Sulikowski : I grew up in Stoney Creek, Ontario, which used to be a seperate town but is now part of Hamilton, where i live now. We used to have a house that was big, and i lived there with my older sister and my two parents who worked a lot. The backyard was lovely, it trailed off into a mountain, so there were trees, and grass, and wild flowers and little animals. I spent most of my time there. I was somewhat of an awkward child, my parents were strict with me and i never had a lot of friends so i played a lot on my own. The forest was my friend, and i imagined many strange and fairy tale like adventures there. 
My parents were always listening to music. They didn’t watch television much. My mother was listening to polish songs all the time things like Halina Kunicka and Zzdislawa Sosnicka. Artists i love and admire today. My father listened to old folk and country, not the popular kind, but the kind that you would hear in the olden days of Texas where cowboys roamed free in the wind.
I got my first organ when i was about 5 or 6 years old. It was a brown Bontempi organ that came with a song book of old time favorites. My father gave me that organ, and now that he is dead i wish more than ever that i still had it today. I played that organ so much, I remember my father playing the songs sitting beside me. Those were nice days.
Eventually a year later i started to get bored of the song book and started making up little melodies. I even tried playing the songs of the song book backwards, and tried to blend in the songs with others in the book. One day, i stole some scissors from my older sister and cut the song book and rearranged parts so i can play them different. Almost like a puzzle. I started to play these new songs and my mother rushed in the room and yelled at me that it sounds horrible and that i should stop, that i need to play the songs as they are in the book, and that i should stop ruining things. The songs in the book i told her became boring. My father came to the rescue and told my mom to leave me alone, and then i continued to play organ.

Does it mean things got darker after your childhood ? How did you come to create the Building Castles Out Of Matchsticks project ?
See it’s been both light and dark for me. I’m an overly sentimental person but not in the sense that i over react or cry a lot to. I just notice everything and can’t help but feel things. Being an intuitive person is perhaps one of the worst and best qualitites about myself. It makes me special, but also dams me in the end. Things got sort of wierd when i got older. My parents were very strict and i wanted to be free so i started to rebel to stay out late to not come home. My mother at age 15 gave me an option either i follow her rules or i move out. I packed my bags only days before i turned 16. I rented a room for 2 years while i was in highschool I worked a lot, to pay rent and went to school all day. Times were hard then but it seemed a lot better than sitting at home being allowed to do almost nothing.
When i was a teenager i felt a real disconnection with those around me. I was very different in many ways. I dressed different thought about different things never really fit in. When your that young and feel so disconnected it is more than hard to simply start a conversation about things besides the weather or homework or tv (i didn’t even watch a tv). It is in highschool that i started to record music. I knew how to play organs and piano but i started to do more obscure things ambient pieces noisy recordings off kilter beats. It wasn’t so lonely for me anymore when i had music to focus on. 
I started university and met new people more people like me who simply didn’t fit in it and i felt much happier. I met a nice boy who i really really liked and thought we could connect but one day led to another and his eyes began to stray and we started fighting and he wasn’t so kind to me and we recorded together in a band and then he broke up. We lived together, and breaking up with him meant loosing most of my belongings musical equipment photos gone and lost. It is hard for a sentimental person like me to go through a breakup. One of the last words he said to me was this "you know Anne, being who you are, i know, you’re never going to go anywhere, or have anything". I still think of those words today. After that relationship i become more introspective than before. He made me think so many things like who am i and what do i even want or what do i even have..... This is the true start of Building Castles Out Of Matchsticks that point that i realized that i indeed had nothing but intended to at least build what i can with what i have.

It certainly makes this project more sincere than everything else. Building Castles Out Of Matchsticks includes everything from music to pictures, films and writing. Is this because you felt you hadn’t created a project which was a complete universe - or were you just curious to explore all these things ?
It’s both things. I build things around myself to make up for the lack of connection i feel with others and the world that surrounds me. The city, the people, the fast cars, i feel so outside of everything that is happening. Like i’m not a part of it. Just an observer. Art makes existance more real to me. I can take something from inside my head and make it into a tangible item that is felt and real on the outside. It gives me a connection.
When you have such a vivid and imaginative and emotional sense of being it is hard to not build a universe that exists in your head. It was mostly music for many many years. Instrumentals. And then i started singing. Things became more personal. Then i got a camera and started taking pictures of the universe that i wanted the world to see. Through my eyes. The films came naturally. And now i do it all.

How do you feel now that your “Secret Land” album is out ?
“Secret Land” is something i hold very true to my heart. And even after considering all my other releases, all my other attempts i feel that now i’m where i should be at with this new album.

Would you call that feeling happiness ?
Yes i think it a sort of melancholic happiness. I’m happy it is complete, and feel a deep connection to my work but melancholic as i listen as these songs are drenched with the fiercest emotions ive ever experienced.

How did you meet Mark from Rothko who released your album through his own Trace Recordings label ?
I saw his myspace page and being a huge Rothko fan i added him. And then he emailed me and we felt this equal connection to each others music so there is began two musical people feeling connected to each others work. I love every recording Mark Beazley has ever done. And mark runs the most warm and welcoming record label.

I totally agree with you about Rothko’s music, such a deep and unique sound. Are there any other musical people you feel connected with ?
Oh yes many. I feel connected to many songs. I have a special soft spot for Flying Saucer Attack, the works of Oval, Yo La Tengo, American Analogue Set, Casino Versus Japan, Broadcast, Sonic Youth and especially for Tarwater.

I don’t know Oval all that well. Are you a compulsive music fan, buying cds and listening to music all the time ?
About 6 years ago i threw my televison into the river while standing on a bridge in front of traffic. This is a true story. Since then i have been tv free. My favorite form of entertainment is and has always been music. Perhaps it is compulsive, one loving something so much, but i see it more as a way of life, rather than a product or an outcome of compulsion.
I do have a huge cd/record collection as i have been involved in my own radio show since i was 19 at campus radio. I like all sorts of music, but mostly i like things that are more electric in nature but music is music and if i feel it then i’m a fan.
Oval is perhaps one of the most innovative electric musical experimenter of our time. He has released some of the most beautiful music i have ever heard. It’s challenging at times, for the new listener, however the rewards are plenty. My personal favorite albums by him are “Ovalprocress” and “Systemish”. Both are emotionally intense, and beautifully composed.

What are your plans for the next few months ?
I am working on a couple of new songs for a new Trace records compilation headed by Mark Beazley. I am also finishing a new EP for Chat Blanc records called "comme une reve, dans la nuit" and a split with my friends Millimetrik., from Quebec City. Besides that i am in school to be a nurse, and my specialty will be in surgery. And also i am spending as much of my time as possible, daydreaming and wandering.

interview by jerome
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december, 2008