Audio Gamer Rebecca Mayes tells us how she gets from playing to singing

A couple of months ago, whilst mooching about on the internet and trying to stay out of trouble, we stumbled across Rebecca Mayes, otherwise known as Audio Gamer.

More specifically, we came across 'Layers', Ms Mayes's song about Peggle: Dual Shot on the DS. It's a strange song, far more haunting and elegiac than the colours and bleeps of Peggle would suggest it needs to be, but a more polished and serious song about video games would be hard to find.

Ms Mayes's other songs are available at GamePeople. They include a review of the PS3 game Flower, called 'This Poem', a Hello Kitty: Big Dreams review called 'Hello Kitty', a Hotel Dusk review called 'The Infuriating and Alluring Case of Mr Kyle Hyde', and a review of Okami Wii called 'I'm a Wolf'.< We caught up with Rebecca Mayes to ask her why she chose to put her musical talents to the subject of video games, who she takes as her inspiration, and which of the guitars you can see her playing in the video at the bottom of this page is her favourite.

Rebecca Mayes: For me writing songs about video games is something completely different, a total contrast to music I've made in the past. I wanted to do something that would be a real challenge.

I like to see where the songwriting process takes me, which can sometimes be quite far from the game. In terms of Peggle, I wanted to write something quite contrary to the game, to bring another angle to it. To be honest I just sit down and see what happens.

When you're writing a song, what comes first: lyrics or music?

I write lyrics and music at the same time. I'll normally get a bit of a groove going on the guitar, some chords that are working nicely and then I'll sing over the top until I stumble upon a lyric that I like. From there the whole thing just unfolds. The thing is to create a structure, a melody line or a chord pattern, and then you have some boundaries to work within.

A lot of times I turn the music down on video games because the repetition gets to doing my head in. I like the music to Flower - particularly because it's interactive with the game and as a player you feel like you're creating the music.

My nylon string Spanish guitar. I took it all the way round the world with me. It's held together with duct tape.

I'm listening to Broken Social Scene right now. They totally float my boat. Unless you mean played on the guitar - that was probably The One I love by REM.

I'm influenced by everything I hear all the time, I don't think I could limit it to a few. Right now I'm loving Feist, Bat for Lashes, Regina Spektor, Sigur Ros...

What's your favourite song?

Of all time?! I''m gonna go with 'Fire and Rain' by James Taylor

Suggestions from gamers (it's worth emailing me if you want to hear me review something particular).

Right now anything's possible. I haven't decided.