The music I heard growing up, since there was no TV or cinema or record covers, I didn't know if it was black, white, hip, square, male, female... whatever. I'd hear melodies and things and got intrigued on that level.
I'm introverted, and I pay attention to my muse... Record companies used to go mad and say 'We don't know the deal with you. You have no continuity at all. You give us 'Addicted to Love,' and you're a rock n' roll star, then you give us 'She Makes My Day,' and what's that?' But that was a hit, too. It either gets across or it doesn't.
My access to music when I was growing up was through pirate radio, you know, transistor radio under the pillow, listening to one more and then 'just one more' until your favourite track comes on.
I joined a band because I didn't like school, and there's nothing else I'd rather have done. If I really wanted to make money, I'd be in real estate. But I'm rich enough. I have a son and daughter, a lovely home, and if I see something I like, I can buy it. That's rich enough.
I've got to the point where I just get on with it and the content of what I put on the records is determined from what I learn from the audience, from what works live, from what I want to hear when I go to a club or what I'd like to play when I get home.
I love Slipknot. But then I like Jao Gilberto... It's the spirit that comes through in music.
I had an invitation to contribute a track to a Robert Johnson tribute album, and it was the first time I'd done anything like that in my life. I was not brought up with the blues or anything like that, and I really, really enjoyed it.
Trying to describe something musical is like dancing to architecture, it's really difficult.
What happens often - although I'm not particularly a victim of this sort of thing - is that somebody will make a quote, or invent a remark and it gets printed, ends up on the 'net and it becomes currency. And some of them are so bizarre!
Eventually, if you had a printer that is IPP compliant, that printer will have a Web address and anyone around the world who can get on the Internet can print to that URL.
Anything by Gonzalez Rubalcaba is unbelievable. I've been listening to the best of Django Reinhardt.
There's hardly anything I've ever done that's made me cringe; I've got pretty good pitch, for a start, so I'm not known for hitting bum notes.
The third note in a chord is what depicts whether it's major or minor. Rhythm and Blues hardly ever uses it because it means that the melody is free to move between major and minor because you're not clashing with the third being depicted one way or the other.
It's marvelous when you visit Tokyo: they have these clubs, and they'll have 'Motown Night' or 'The Beatles - Totally Authentic and Live!' You know it's shrunk, but at least there's some sort of youthful figure to it. Whereas, the blues scene in Europe is more like, 'Here we go again.'
My listening changed when I heard music from Stax, Atlantic, Motown because by that age I thought anything that my parents listened to must be square. So I had to find my own rock n' roll, as it were, and I found it in black soul music.
I hardly ever get asked about music. I do, however, get asked about the 'Addicted to Love' video and my suits on a daily basis.
My parents were part of a crowd that was attached to all the different navies stationed in Malta. When they would have parties in each other's houses, I would get taken along, and that's where I heard all this great music. I didn't distinguish particular styles; it was all music to me.
I loved the music, but the excesses of rock n' roll never really appealed to me at all. I couldn't see the point of getting up in front of a lot of people when you weren't in control of your wits.
I'm not concerned that my stuff isn't extreme. I don't want to be heavy. I can't think of another attitude to have toward an audience than a hopeful and a positive one. And if that includes such unfashionable things as sentimentality, well, I can afford it.
I believe that my music is just about feelings, and the style is just a side effect.
