During an interview last year, the New York-based singer-songwriter Regina Spektor argued that the real price artists pay for success is the glare it subjects their subsequent work to. Art of any type, she suggested, struggles to thrive and renew itself under the bright lights, and is, in any case, not meant to be created within business conditions. (She didn't specify what these conditions are, but it is likely she meant the conventional music business, which has spat out as much talent as it has nurtured, and possibly more.)
One way of avoiding this, of course, is to sit at home creating masterpieces nobody else hears. Another, as Ingrid Michaelson has discovered, is to do things on your own terms and stay as far away from the record industry as you feasibly can.
It's a strategy that has certainly worked for the 30-year-old, who grew up across the water from Spektor on Staten Island, the daughter of a sculptor mother and composer father, and could therefore be said to cleave naturally to both creativity and outsider status. Since 2007, when her songs were first featured in commercials and on television shows such as Grey's Anatomy, the singer has sold hundreds of thousands of copies of her records, which she releases on her own label, and she now competes with the likes of Madonna for most-added-song kudos on the American download chart.
From the start, she and her management took a boutique approach, rebuffing the inevitable big-money offers from major labels, and opting instead to build a word-of-mouth buzz via ad syncs and MySpace. This may have saved Michaelson from having the hot breath of bean-counters on the back of her neck, but it did not prevent accusations of selling out. She has a notably sharp - and characteristically crisp - way of dealing with such detractors.
"When I first got accused of that, I thought, 'I live with a toilet that backs up, there are cockroaches rampaging through my apartment. I could really use an upgrade in my life right now, so I'm going to continue to put my songs on Grey's Anatomy if that's okay with you, so I can have a better life and continue to make music.'" There will, she acknowledges, always be what she calls "snobs, people who like to find a way to cut you down. But, you know, people don't have to like what I'm doing. And I have my morals; I've turned down a lot of money for commercials for things I don't want to be associated with. So I'm not like, 'Everybody, take my songs, give me your money.' But if it's for some sweater commercial, or in the background of a romantic scene in a TV show, who the f*** cares? Get over it. Why are you attacking me? Plus, more and more people are syncing their music, so it's going to be an obsolete argument pretty soon. I mean, there will always be that core group of nerdy, sweaty, balding men that have everything on vinyl and won't buy anything digitally - but, you know, they'll die lonely and virgins".
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She cackles as she says this, echoing the laughter that is such a feature of her live shows. A recent packed gig in London saw a word-perfect crowd sing Michaelson's songs back at her, and respond warmly to the humour of her intersong banter, which has a comic timing that attests to her college background in comedy improv. Her music builds from bare bones - acoustic guitar, banjo, piano and close harmony - to a disarming communal experience, and her new album, Everybody, fits neatly alongside the likes of Spektor, Edie Brickell, Feist and Norah Jones, its shard-filled lyrics nestling on comforting cushions of sound. It is unlikely ever to be described as cool, but no matter: both its creator and her fans are relaxed enough to have a good singsong and laugh at their soppiness at the same time.
"I recharge up there on stage," Michaelson says. "I try to let the audience dictate where it goes; I like when people shout things and I use that to change the show. The best thing is starting out with an audience that is very tight and polite, and ending up yanking them out of their shells. That feels like success."
Before she started writing songs, Michaelson had dreams of making it as an actor in musical theatre, but these were worn away by sometimes glaring evidence that she was, as she puts it, "not good enough. And I didn't realise how difficult it was to do something meaningful in theatre. There was this one crappy job where we did a Charles Dickens play all around the Midwest for little kids, and I got to thinking, 'Do I want to be 37 and playing Tiny Tim's mum in this shitty version of A Christmas Carol? Is that really what I want my life to be?' And the answer was no".
The songs, when they first came, were, Michaelson admits, "dreadfully stamped with musical theatre, with vibrato all over the place. But at the time I thought that was the only avenue I could go down - the whole female, barefoot singer-songwriter thing. I wasn't brave enough at the beginning. Then I started to listen to bands such as Death Cab for Cutie and Regina, and I thought, 'I want to do that, I want to sing about [the hair-loss medication] Rogaine.' I remember struggling with that, thinking, 'Can I use that word?' Then thinking, 'Why not? I can say that, I can be silly if I want to.'
"That song [The Way I Am] ended up being the one that became a huge deal over in the States, so it showed me I could choose to say anything I wanted to say and let the chips fall where they may."
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She is happy, she says, to continue with the DIY approach, although her decision isn't, she stresses, a fiercely principled one: it's still business, in other words. "If you choose to be a musician, to make records and play shows, to sell those records and make money, you are putting yourself into the business. On one level, your music is what you are peddling."
She describes the effect of growing up on Staten Island as "a built-in separation - we're like the stepchild of New York City. People don't even remember we're there". You sense this suited, and suits, her fine. Running with the in crowd, or the record industry, is no more for Michaelson than hoofing around the American heartland playing Mrs Cratchit to fidgety children. In her quiet way, she communicates loudly: "I like to welcome people into my house - at least, that's what writing and performing feels like. It sounds cheesy, but I just want everyone to feel good, and warm, and welcome."
Everybody will be released on February 8 on Cabin 24