A passionate interest in what you do is the secret of enjoying life. . . whether it is helping old people or children, or making cheese or growing earthworms.
I was always wrapped around music being a tradition, a skill.
Because the Internets there, I have access to a lot of the legends, like Fela Kuti. I used to watch a lot of Fela Kuti videos, just to see how he performed. He inspired me a lot, actually, because he was a man of many words, many good words.
Sometimes I'll listen to a lyric and I'll be so pissed off that I didn't write it.
I've mainly been sampling jazz because the tone of the chords are expressive in itself, so it's quite nice to write over.
My mum used to work in New York in Spike Lee's shop, she did the outfits for the video for P. M. Dawn's "Set Adrift on Memory Bliss".
I actually find a lot of pleasure in writing lyrics.
[Freud's] great strength, though sometimes also his weakness, was the quite extraordinary respect he had for the singular fact. . . When he got hold of a simple but significant fact he would feel, and know, that it was an example of something general or universal, and the idea of collecting statistics on the matter was quite alien to him.
I understand the self-loathing and the resentment, and the discipline that it takes to sit down in front of a typewriter or computer every single day, whether it's going well or not going well.
I want to know if you can disappoint another to be true to yourself. If you can bear the accusation of betrayal and not betray your own soul. . I want to know if you can live with failure, yours and mine,. and still stand at the edge of the lake and shout. . . "Yes. ". I want to know if you can get up. weary and bruised to the bone and do what needs to be done. . I want to know what sustains you. when all else falls away.
Leadership used to be about ideas, setting an example and doing the right thing. Today, if you make enough money for the firm (and are not currently an ax murderer) you will be promoted into a position of influence.