This is a gorgeous cover, right? I know I’m an Adele-loonie, but this cover just feels soooo iconic. And Adele deserves it too – Adele is breaking every record out there, just by being herself and having fun and being a total professional. The Time interview – which you can read here – took place in November, as Adele was promoting the album in NYC. She was sort of surprised by the reaction to her album by Americans in particular, but at least she’s not insulting us. Yay! Some highlights:

She has “no idea” how she sold so many records: “It’s a bit ridiculous. I’m not even from America. Maybe they think I’m related to the Queen. Americans are obsessed with the royal family.”

She hates the word “brand”: “They all use that word. It makes me sound like a fabric softener, or a packet of crisps.”

She doesn’t want to be an a—hole: “Some artists, the bigger they get, the more horrible they get, and the more unlikable. I don’t care if you make an amazing album—if I don’t like you, I ain’t getting your record. I don’t want you being played in my house if I think you’re a bastard.”

Being raised in Tottenham by a single mom: “The environment in which my kid is growing up couldn’t be further away from the way I grew up. But there was never any embarrassment about showing love in my family.”

Taking a break to have son Angelo: “I was very conscious to make sure that our bond was strong and unbreakable. I had to get to that point before I’d come back.”

Her relationship with Simon Konecki. “We’re in a grownup, adult, mature relationship. I didn’t want to write about us, because I didn’t want to make us feel uncomfortable… Can you imagine if I was singing about texting? You would never get me singing about having a drink in the club.”

She writes music the old-school way: “I’m not precious about writing credits—it’s whatever makes the best song. But I can’t do that. I can’t write a song based on a track… I write a song from beginning to end. I don’t go in sections. It’s a story… I’m not saying my album is incredible, but there’s conviction in it. And I believe the f-ck out of myself on this album.”

She’s not all about social media: “It’s ridiculous that high-profile people have that much access to the public. How am I supposed to write a real record if I’m waiting for half a million likes on a photo? That ain’t real.”

She didn’t want her album to be streamed: “I don’t use streaming. I buy my music. I download it, and I buy a physical [copy] just to make up for the fact that someone else somewhere isn’t. It’s a bit disposable, streaming. I know that streaming music is the future, but it’s not the only way to consume music,” she says. She believes “music should be an event.”

What she thinks of the comparisons to Taylor Swift (just with the streaming thing): “It was amazing. I love her—how powerful she is. We’ll get lumped together now because of it, but I think we would both feel the ability to say yes or no to things even if we weren’t successful.”

She thinks we should slow down: “The speed with which we discover and get over things is too fast. I’m frightened that I’m not going to be able to relate to my kid.”

[From Time Magazine]

She also tells Time Magazine that she’s already thinking ahead to her tour and how Angelo is going to come with her. She hasn’t been on tour since 2011, right? That’s when she had to cancel tour dates because of her voice. As for the rest of it… the one thing that bothers me is subscribing this goddess-like 20/20 vision to Adele, like she planned it out to take an extended hiatus when she was the biggest thing in music. I just don’t believe she had it planned out like that – she’s smart, but not cunning. It wasn’t some sort of scheme. She met a guy, she fell in love and she got pregnant quickly, irrespective of what was going on with her career. And I like that Adele said something nice about Taylor Swift, at long last. Now Taylor looks like the Mean Girl who won’t even acknowledge Adele’s presence.

Photos courtesy of WENN.