I just go into the studio, look at the lyrics for the first time when I put them on the piano, and go. If I haven't got it within 40 minutes, I give up. It's never changed, the thrill has never gone, because I don't know what I'm going to get next.

I grew up in the Fifties and early Sixties, which were still quite conservative, and I wasn't given any information about sex or anything like that... I went out with girls at school because one had to. I didn't experiment with sex for quite a long time.

Anyone who lip-synchs in public on stage when you pay 75 pounds to see them should be shot.

I knew about AIDS. My friends were dying right, left, and center. I did a record with Dionne Warwick, Stevie Wonder, and Gladys Knight. I did a couple of benefits.

If there's a God in heaven, what's he waiting for? If He can't hear the children, then he must see the war.

But actually, my drug addiction thing, I was so stubborn.

Onstage, it was always comfortable for me, because that's where I felt at home. Offstage, it was a different situation. I was still shy offstage.