I'm not a singer, a walking instrument like Aretha Franklin. When you get an Iggy Pop record, you don't get "Iggy Sings." I am also a style of music, an approach.

I thought that if I practiced doing melodies for a year or so at home, I would learn to think melodically, and when I went to work it would come out, and it did, on this album. What else was important to me...? I spend a lot of time in the grocery store, shopping.

I don't think I'm lucky; I think I have a tough constitution. That's a lot of it. And I've been wise enough to listen to other people. I was unconsciously cultivating as many straight friends as I could.

Music is life, and life is not a business.

Stages are getting higher and higher, and I'm getting older and older.

I never say never about anything.

It's the same thing: I would think, "If I can't go out and pull some teenager tonight, maybe I'm no good on stage anymore." And you start to think that you even need it as a motivation. I did, anyway.