I don't perform. Seals perform.

This position I've held ... it pays may way and it corrodes my soul.

I never imagined I'd be a solo artist. And now I couldn't imagine being part of a group.

I have an unswayable obsession with death. If there was a magical pill that one could take that would retire you from the world, I would take it.

You say: 'Oh, please forgive' You say: 'Oh, live and let live.' But sorry doesn't help us. Sorry will not save us. Sorry is just a word you find so easy to say (so you say it anyway). Sorry doesn't help us. Sorry won't protect us. Sorry won't undo all the good gone wrong.

The solo years have been more meaningful to the audiences than the Smiths years, but the press in England only write about me in relation to the Smiths era.

Whenever I’d over­hear how people found me to be ‘a bit much’ (which is the gentle way of say­ing the word ‘unbear­able’), I under­stood why. To myself I would say: Well, yes of course I’m a bit much — if I weren’t, I would not be lit up by so many lights.