It sounds like a cliche, but it... you do sing about what you know about. And I grew up in a small town, and I grew up in a place where your whole world revolved around friends, family, school, and church, and sports.
Every day I wake up and I lay in bed counting my blessings and saying my prayers for how fortunate I am to have great fans and health and family.
People don't understand that where I come from, everyone is either a convict, been in jail, been in a gang, is a hooligan of some sorts, but those are my brothers, my family and the people that I travel with. Those are the people that I roll with.
We spent last night listening to Liverpool football team on the radio, wanting them to win so badly. Paul supports Liverpool. He was Everton for a while because of his family - but it's all Liverpool now.
My family comes from New Zealand, but I'm a London girl. I was born and raised in London, but I've got the blood of a New Zealander, so I always kind of felt like I didn't belong - in a good way.
My father had played the guitar when he was young, and my uncle Jack had worked for Kalamazoo, before the war, developing guitar pickups. So there was a kind of family thing about the guitar, although it was considered something of an anomaly then.
I'd always been insecure. Being the fourth of five kids means attention is divided five ways, and to do this equally is impossible. I grew up feeling like the little orphan in the family, the one who didn't fit in.
I just went to Harvard a little while, because I graduated from Armstrong High School in Washington and then I went up there but I didn't stay that long because I went into show business.
I think I'd have to say my favorite IWC. They have been around for so long and the craftsmanship is top notch. A watch maker that has been in business over 100 years has to know what they are doing.
Once you start trying to sell creativity, you're always going to run into the problem that the people selling it aren't as creative as the people making it, and the people making it don't know how to talk business with the people trying to sell it.
Major labels didn't start showing up really until they smelled money, and that's all they're ever going to be attracted to is money-that's the business they're in- making money.
Thinking back on it, I've been in this business since I was 3, and I grew up in musical theater, so I was raised and surrounded by gay men and gay women. I was hardly around anyone straight.
I've been mocked a lot. I've been made fun of, you know, of the standards that I keep out, and that I hold out on the road and the way I conduct my business and myself and the way I behave in this business.
There seems to be a great propensity in this business to write tear-jerkers, 'You-left-me' songs. I thought, 'Why don't I count my blessings by looking at what I have?' I'm pretty much an optimistic guy.
I would absolutely, definitely never sell my wedding pictures to a magazine. I'd like it to be a special day, not a photo shoot. And once you've done that, your marriage becomes everybody else's business.
After 'Kelis Was Here,' I was done. I was like, 'I will never put out another record again; I hate this business; I hate all these people.' I was in this race that I didn't even realise that I was in.
A lot of times in this business, we are taking advantage of hot times in our career to do a lot of TV and a lot of radio and that sort of thing, and George is able to be so humble that he can get away with not doing those things.
I'm 47 years old. I couldn't compete with Beyonce. I'm not competing with anyone. I've already established myself as an artist. I've been in this business for 30 years. There's no reason for me to compete with anyone.
I finally got a chance to talk to my daughter from my previous marriage. I just got married May 3 to my beautiful wife, but we don't see each other much.
I'm sure that the meaning of the songs that I've written will change for me over the years, the same way that I can't even say what inspired some of the songs that I've been singing for a long time anymore.
I think people who go out and tell you how much they're gonna change things are the people who end up being just another whatever. I'm never trying to change anything. That's not for me.
