I find it hard to take rock groups very seriously or treat them with respect. There is something absurd about these gloomy young men getting together and banging away.

Drinking was a big help with me making music, because drinking gives you courage. But it also makes you reckless, and that's the trouble.

We did not get any money from the early records. It was all taken by crooked managers. It is just a gangster's paradise.

Because I'm associated with an avant-garde sensibility, people think I'm looking down on popular culture, but I don't want to be part of a new elitism.

I get slightly irritated by people who say they're natural rebels because it just means that they're going to be against whatever anybody does, which is almost like saying you might as well leave it as it is.

I have never felt in tune with the whole rock industry.

The gap between rich and poor is, in fact, widening enormously. This idea of building up the powers of people who are already powerful and keeping everyone else back is a recipe for endless misery and conflict.