I'm just about the best singer I know, and it's time for everybody to say that. I have total facility with my voice. And for some weird reason, critics don't talk about it.
The best way to have a good idea is to have a lot of ideas.
We are all different expressions of one reality, different songs of one singer, different dances of one dancer, different paintings – but the painter is one.
Most chick singers say 'if you hurt me, I'll die'... I say, 'if you hurt me, I'll kick your ass.'
I think I'd be a million times more successful and more iconic if I was a singer in the '40s. I'd be allowed a level of mystery, and I think I'd suit that decade.
As a singer, I have won the highest honours in China. Actually I am like the panda: we are both national treasures.
If I have any regrets, I could say that I'm sorry I wasn't a better writer or a better singer.
I think people feel starved of nice, glamorous entertainment. They want to see costumes and gaiety and a singer; old-fashioned entertainment - it won't die easily.
I have the soul of a singer and do splendidly in the shower but the world will never hear it. Basically, I'm the only Irish person who can't carry a tune.
I was constantly being pushed toward a European ideal of what it means to be a classical or opera singer, let's say in the Renata Tebaldi mode. I reject that.
When I was very young I wanted to be a professional horseback rider. Then I wanted to be a pop singer. Then I wanted to be a psychiatrist. Then I wanted to be a movie director.
There's so many singers, you watch them and a lot of it is waving around. You don't get this feeling that they're really thinking about what they're saying.
I don't think writing or co-writing my songs makes me a better singer, but I haven't really got an excuse not to do it as I've got too many opinions!
I think I've become a much better singer and a much better player. Years and years of playing a couple of hours every day will do that.
Lou Reed is something like a personal favorite of mine, but you could always put me into that drawer of singers who can't really sing, who speak their songs.
I'm a big fan of skilled singers. Some of my favorites are Cee-Lo Green, Donny Hathaway, James Fauntleroy, and Kim Burrell.
On stage, generally speaking, the story is stopped or held back by songs, because that's the convention. Audiences enjoy the song and the singer, that's the point.
Like an opera singer, I am able to sing out my song in paint.
A lot of singers find a musical genre people like and stick with it. That's being a conformist. I sing ballads, rock, salsa, rap.
I think a lot of singer-songwriters get compared to each other, but I'd like to think that what I'm doing is special and specific to me.
It worries me that young singers think you can shortcut the training and go straight to fame and fortune, and programmes like Pop Idol have encouraged that.
