For the past 10 years, Lights has taken on the pop, indie and punk worlds with her music. While she gained various experiences by living in different parts of the globe as a child and inspired some of her earlier songwriter, marriage, motherhood and just plain growing up has ignited her creativity to release 2014's Little Machines but also spin the record on its head in 2016 for an acoustic version called Midnight Machines, which just dropped this past April.

While Lights was in New York City to play a packed Webster Hall show earlier this month,  we had the chance to grab a burrito bowl at Oxido in Manhattan's Flatiron District and chat about what she's been up to lately.  Noshing on guacamole, she explained that acoustic music shouldn't just be stripped versions of original tracks but a new rendition.

“I do know that some bands do acoustic versions and think that they can just pick up an acoustic guitar and sing the song the exact same way but pounding away during an acoustic set,” she said. “But you don’t get anything new out of it. It’s totally the same. An acoustic version shouldn’t be less. It should be new.”

She also follows the same mantra whenever she covers others' music. “And you don’t want to do covers in the same way. When I do a Drake cover, I do it my way. I reinvent them. I try to make them as good. I want people to be like, ‘This could be the original.’ They’re just different.”

Giving her studio albums the acoustic treatment isn't a new practice for Lights. However, transforming Little Machines into Midnight Machines had a little extra something that made it special.

“I intended that,” she explains. “I set this precedent that I would do acoustic versions of my albums, but I never like doing what’s expected. So I wanted to give into that more. We took Midnight Machines to the next level with a string quartet and full band and had revised versions of the songs instead of just going acoustic. We took the songs that you wouldn’t expect to be that way. I just left the songs that were like already [acoustic-sounding] on Little Machines and took the high energy anthems like “Up We Go” and “Running With the Boys” and turn them to late night lullabies.”

She adds, “It’s exciting to show a side of the songs that you didn’t know existed. You can see something so differently depending on what we put around it. Music dictates things, and it was a cool test of that power.”

While the album is full of acoustic versions of her faster hits, Lights also included a number of new tracks, naming “Follow You Down” as one of her proudest musical moments.

“That’s honestly one of my most proudest songs,” she exclaims. “I love the way it turned out. I lose myself in it every time I play it. There’s really no rhyme or reason. It’s about the depths you go for somebody you love—romantic or not. There’s people you love in different levels of relationships. And when they’re intense or deep enough like family, then how far would you go for somebody? And I never wrote about that before. It’s a new experience, and that’s why I like it so much.”

"Follow You Down" might be her favorite on this record, but she's also proud of the visual she made for "Meteorites"—even though it was a bit of a challenge to create.

“It’s in reverse and in slow motion," she explains, "so I had to learn the song reverse, singing backwards and singing at 200 percent faster so it could be done in slow motion.”

If you think her life can't get hectic enough, Lights is also a mom to two-year-old Rocket Wild, who she admits is more likely to ask for a song about dinosaurs or about her dad, Blessthefall's Beau Bokan, than one of Lights' originals.

“She just comes into the room and hits the guitar and asks me to sing a song about dinos,” she says with a giggle. “Or she’ll come up with key words, and I’ll have to sing about them. So I’ll have be singing something, and she’ll tell me to sing the ‘Daddy Song.’ So I’ll sub in some words and whatever makes her happy.”

Balancing motherhood with her musical and art career might seem like a daunting task, but Lights says that it's something that she doesn't really need a lot of convincing to do. While she loves music, her family comes first.

“You don’t have to try,” she conveys. “If you love somebody you make it work, no matter what. If I’m running late for press or soundcheck or something because she’s crying, that matters more to me. And I’ll be late. I’d rather be late and spend some time with her and make sure she’s feeling okay, make sure she’s good before I leave.”

She also adds, “I don’t want to have a bad taste in her mouth about music or what I do. I want her to love music and every step of the way. So I think you have to follow your instincts when you’re a mother. There’s really no book. Believe me, I tried to read one and realized this was different kind of parenting. As long as you love your kid, it’ll work out.”

If there's anything that she's learned being a mom, it's that time really is of the essence.

“I’m a lot more productive if that makes any sense,” she expresses. “[Before] I think I took my time for granted. Time is the biggest commodity someone could have, and you take it for granted until you don’t have any of it. Then when you have a little bit of it, you try to get stuff done. So that’s kind of my life now. So when she’s busy or sleeping, I just write and draw and work on creative stuff and love it so much. But before I just didn’t understand the value of finding those moments to do it.”