Miley Cyrus, Feeling Empowered, Returns to the MTV Stage

This weekend, Miley Cyrus is throwing a rager. Everyone's invited, and MTV is footing the bill. (Also Read: Miley Cyrus' Tongue Launches a Thousand Selfies)

"They said, 'This is your party,'" Cyrus, 22, said of the network's Video Music Awards, which she will host Sunday night from the Microsoft Theater here, starting at 9 p.m. And she's taking MTV at its word, helping to plan a show she promises will be "psychedelic" and "raw," unlike any other.

"I didn't want this VMAs to be like they've been in the past," Cyrus, in workout gear, said at her home studio, where she is recording what she has called "avant-garde" music with Wayne Coyne of the Flaming Lips. "Last year there wasn't even a host, so there was no energy."

The last time Cyrus took the stage at the Video Music Awards, two years ago, she performed, tongue unleashed, with giant teddy bears (stepping out of one, into her new reality), a phallic foam finger and a pre-crash Robin Thicke - prompting a thousand think pieces about slut-shaming, racial appropriation for her use of black female dancers and the meaning of twerking. Some critics cried "minstrel show," while cable news host Mika Brzezinski said, "There's pushing the envelope and there's porn - there's raunchy porn that's disgusting and disturbing." (The next year, when Cyrus won Video of the Year for "Wrecking Ball," she sent a homeless youth to speak for her with seriousness.)

This year, Cyrus will have a chance to provoke again, but as the host instead of a performer, she'll have more control (and screen time), setting the tone for the show. She comes equipped with a newly focused visual aesthetic - including lo-fi, "surrealist" work from underground Net artists - that until recently was manifested most clearly in her bonkers, animal-heavy Instagram feed.

The video awards will also feature Kanye West receiving the Michael Jackson Video Vanguard Award, along with performances by the Weeknd and a re-emerging Justin Bieber.

In between freshly rolled joints, Cyrus spoke in a stream of consciousness about her MTV memories (growing up onstage), her thoughts on the nominees (not her thing) and just who let this hosting gig happen (someone with nothing to lose). These are edited excerpts from the conversation.

Q: How do you think back on the Video Music Awards in 2013?

A: Everything I've ever done has been true to me at that minute. Even down to my TV show (Hannah Montana) - when I started I was 12 years old, and that was like a dream to me. So that was my truth at that moment.

Me coming out of that teddy bear, to me, wasn't just a teddy bear. My dad always explained it to me that you step into your happiness. That's kind of like what I was doing. When I broke down the bear belly, I was really breaking out - my show ended, and then I didn't really work for two years. That's when I did my most self-exploration. (The performance) was kind of going into this way of saying, "I'm just going to do what will make me happy." At that moment, that's what really made me happy.

Q: Why did people think it was so shocking?

A: When you look at it now, it looks like I'm playing hopscotch. Compared to what I do now, it looks like nothing. I can't believe that was a big deal. It wasn't shocking at all.

I was in the studio with Kanye (later) that night, and we watched it back and we didn't say anything. He was like, "That was sick," whatever. We woke up the next day, and he was like, "Whoa." He called and said, "Turn on your TV." I was staying at the Trump Hotel and Donald Trump literally called and said, basically, "I know everyone's talking about it, but I loved it." I had no idea anyone was talking about it yet.

Even people around me really judged me. People that I really loved and thought were my friends judged me for it. They were like, "You were on drugs when you did that performance." I did nothing! I still don't get it.

Q: Twerking became the hottest issue in the nation.

A: Dude, it was insane. I became that girl - I was the face of twerking, which didn't really matter. That wasn't what it was about.

Q: What was your relationship with Robin Thicke like after?

A: I didn't really know him too much before, and I don't really know him now. It was funny, because I got so much of the heat for it, but that's just being a woman. He acted like he didn't know that was going to happen. You were in rehearsals! You knew exactly what was going to happen. And he was actually the one that approved my outfit, so I thought that was very funny. He wanted me as naked as possible, because that's how his video was. It was very much a collaboration. My part - We Can't Stop - was all me. But when it went into Blurred Lines, that was his performance.

Q: Do you feel defiant about it?

A: I still love it. But I now watch it, and I see someone that isn't me now.

Q: Who was that girl?

A: I knew who I was, and I knew the power that I held, but I don't think I realized my full power until that show. I didn't realize I could make such a big reaction. I didn't think that many people would care. I knew I was famous, but I didn't know what that meant. Everything was coming to an end and starting a new beginning. In every way.

Q: Do you feel like you lost control of your own narrative?

A: I feel like those moments are blackout moments. I remember knowing the night before that it was the first time I would get to perform in this new way. But I didn't expect it to be what it became. When it was, something clicked in my mind: This many people notice me? If I'm going to be noticed by this many people, what am I really going to say? What I want to say isn't "shake your ass." But even if you listen to Can't Stop, it isn't how I'd say it now, but it is still saying the same thing: "I'm going to do whatever I want." Now I know how to say that in my own words, not just in the way that's a hit.

Q: How did the conversation start to bring you back to the video awards?

A: Van Toffler, who runs MTV, it was his last year. He's leaving, and so he can't get fired. He was like, "I want to do something crazy - I want you to host the VMAs, because I want that to be my last shebang." It's like Ferris Bueller's Day Off.

Q: Did you ever think, "I've already done my VMAs thing"?

A: No, I wanted to do it right away. I love the VMAs. I love MTV. I don't watch it, but what I used to watch of it I love.

Q: Will you have an opening monologue?

A: Seth Rogen and his team helped us write a lot. (Artist) Jen Stark is doing the introduction for me, so I'm coming out of one of her pieces. What I'm trying to do is create my Instagram - which people love to think is so freaky - in real life. It's letting people into my world.

Q: Are you going to tell jokes?

A: I'm not a stand-up. That's what it always feels like - like everything's flopping and dying out there. So my intro is fun skits.

Q: Were you concerned that these video awards would just constantly rehash the 2013 stuff?

A: I wouldn't let them do it.

Q: So you're not going to make jokes about twerking on Robin Thicke?

A: There's not one. I wasn't going to just get out there and make jokes about the past.

Q: What did you make of the Nicki Minaj controversy around the VMAs - that she was upset Anaconda wasn't nominated for Video of the Year?

A: I saw that. I didn't really get into it. I know there was some beef. I don't really know. There's a way to talk to people

Q: Do you know what she said?

A: She was saying that everyone was white and blonde that got nominated, I heard? And then Taylor Swift butted in.

Q: She may have alluded to Wrecking Ball also, saying that when a naked white girl breaks a Vevo record she gets nominated.

A: I didn't follow it. You know what I always say? Not that this is jealousy, but jealousy does the opposite of what you want it to - that's a yoga mantra. People forget that the choices that they make and how they treat people in life affect you in a really big way. If you do things with an open heart and you come at things with love, you would be heard and I would respect your statement. But I don't respect your statement because of the anger that came with it.

And it's not anger like, "Guys, I'm frustrated about some things that are a bigger issue." You made it about you. Not to sound like a bitch, but that's like, "Eh, I didn't get my VMA."

Q: But she was

A: If you want to make it about race, there's a way you could do that. But don't make it just about yourself. Say: "This is the reason why I think it's important to be nominated. There's girls everywhere with this body type."

Q: I think she did say that

A: What I read sounded very Nicki Minaj, which, if you know Nicki Minaj is not too kind. It's not very polite. I think there's a way you speak to people with openness and love. You don't have to start this pop star against pop star war. It became Nicki Minaj and Taylor in a fight, so now the story isn't even on what you wanted it to be about. Now you've just given E! News "Catfight! Taylor and Nicki Go at It."

I know you can make it seem like, Oh I just don't understand because I'm a white pop star. I know the statistics. I know what's going on in the world. But to be honest, I don't think MTV did that on purpose.

Q: Do you have favorite videos from this crop?

A: I don't even really know too much of what's nominated.

Q: Anaconda is nominated for some, Bad Blood, Kendrick Lamar's Alright, Ed Sheeran ...

A: I like what Kendrick does. I don't really know many of these. I don't really listen to this music. I'm probably the most disconnected host in history. I don't have TV. I have Apple TV. I'm so the 22-year-old that's like, "Who's TV?"