The public library is the great equaliser.

If you don't know the blues... there's no point in picking up the guitar and playing rock and roll or any other form of popular music.

It made me sick - my name's Keith Richards. It hardly makes it against Howlin' Wolf or Muddy Waters, does it? On my first guitar I had Boy Blue written - just pathetic. But that was as good as I got at the time.

In fact, I take the view that God, in his infinite wisdom, didn't bother to spring for two joints - heaven and hell. They're the same place, but heaven is when you get everything you want and you meet Mummy and Daddy and your best friends and you all have a hug and a kiss and play your harps. Hell is the same place - no fire and brimstone - but they just all pass by and don't see you. There's nothing, no recognition. You're waving, “It's me, your father,” but you're invisible. You're on a cloud, you've got your harp, but you can't play with nobody because they don't see you. That's hell.

To me, the main thing about living on this planet is to know who the hell you are and be real about it. That's the reason I'm still alive.

Music works in mysterious ways. Once it goes in you have no idea what it can do to you.

Why would you want to be anything else if you're Mick Jagger?