Friday was added to my nickname because I have a talent of getting on with most people. So it's a bit of a man Friday thing.

Friday was added to my nickname because I have a talent of getting on with most people. So it's a bit of a man Friday thing.

We had similar interests with Derek Rowan and Paul Hewson; it sounds really pretentious at 12, 13 year old kids were like into art and poetry, but we were. We weren't into football, we were into making music or being into music and painting and stuff like that. And we called this sort of little gang Lypton Village and we made up imaginary games and this is one day we'll form bands and one day we'll make movies and one day we'll do this and one day we'll do that. A lot of kids do this in their own way, except 25, 30 years later legend happens because some of us have become quite well known.

I get anxious but worry doesn't really do any good. If something is broken or in trouble, you've got to bend down, pick it up and fix it. Worry just makes us get wrinkles. So try not worrying.

Music and books were my inspiration too. I read avidly as a kid. And that's the beautiful thing about books and music and even movies, is that you can actually escape. You can go into other worlds.

One of the biggest problems I found with Irish politics and the economic thing was after the war, after World War II, most of the European countries started to develop economically and socially, but whatever way the Catholic church they took a grip and they almost governed the country. I mean, we were almost like a dictatorship. There is good and bad, but we experienced an awful lot of bad, especially from the institutions that taught children the Christian brothers, etc.

We don't have a long of natural resources as a country; we have a very beautiful country. Visually, I mean, everyone goes on about it's green, it's the mountains and the rivers and it's clean and it's not that populated. It is stunningly beautiful, but we've no oil. We've no coal. We've no money. We just have Ireland.