Björk: Music saved me

Björk's heart has been healed by music.

The Icelandic star released her ninth studio album Vulnicura last month, which chronicles her split from long-term boyfriend Matthew Barney.

Writing the tracks helped Björk deal with the breakup, and she is now through the worst of it.

"I can't begin to describe how much better I feel, just physically. Obviously, life is not that black and white. Something will happen to me in five years, and it might come back to life. But I am out of that emergency stage, when you feel like a space alien, just possessed," she told Rolling Stone magazine.

As well as her music, 49-year-old Björk is well known for her outlandish outfits. She donned the famous Swan Dress (which looked like a dead bird draped around her) for the 2001 Oscars, and often wears uncomfortable looking clothes.

Despite her confident exterior, the eccentric singer is not immune from down days and likens her split from Matthew to a teenage breakup.

"[Writing the album] was a survival mechanism. I thought, all the way to the last day [of the relationship], that everything would be fine. Maybe that's why it was such a shock to me. At first, I was just going to put the songs together and not say anything. But putting the months on - it felt right. It would justify being that full of self-pity. When people listen to these lyrics, I can go, 'It was only two months after the breakup. I was a teenage mess!'" she explained.