“A lot of music you might listen to is pretty vapid, it doesn't always deal with our deeper issues. These are the things I'm interested in now, particularly at my age.”
“Life expectancy in many parts of Africa can be something around the age of thirty five to thirty eight. I mean you're very fortunate if you live to that age. In fact when I went to Uganda for the first time one of the things that occurred to me was that I saw very few elderly people.”
“For me, pointing and clicking my phone is absolutely fine. People say that isn't the art of photography but I don't agree.”
“Most women are dissatisfied with their appearance - it's the stuff that fuels the beauty and fashion industries.”
“When I look at the majority of my own songs they really came from my own sense of personal confusion or need to express some pain or beauty - they were coming from a universal and personal place.”
“The future hasn't happened yet and the past is gone. So I think the only moment we have is right here and now, and I try to make the best of those moments, the moments that I'm in.”
“Ask yourself: Have you been kind today? Make kindness your daily modus operandi and change your world.”
“I don't have clear-cut positions. I get baffled by things. I have viewpoints. Sometimes they change.”
“Dying is easy, it's living that scares me to death.”
“I mean, I'm 48 years old and I've been through a lot in my life - you know, loss, whether it be death, illness, separation. I mean, the failed expectations... We all have dreams.”
“I am fascinated by history and particularly the Victorian era.”
“Although I have lived in London, I have never really considered London my home because it was always going to be a stopping-off point for me, and it has been too.”
“We all fight over what the label 'feminism' means but for me it's about empowerment. It's not about being more powerful than men - it's about having equal rights with protection, support, justice. It's about very basic things. It's not a badge like a fashion item.”
“Money is a good thing and it's obviously useful, but to work only for money or fame would never interest me.”
“I would say that although my music may be or may have been part of the cultural background fabric of the gay community, I consider myself an outsider who belongs everywhere and nowhere... Being a human being is what truly counts. That's where you'll find me.”
“I think music is the most phenomenal platform for intellectual thought.”
“Music is an extraordinary vehicle for expressing emotion - very powerful emotions. That's what draws millions of people towards it. And, um, I found myself always going for these darker places and - people identify with that.”
“I love to make music and stay grounded.”
“I only want to make music because I have a passion for it.”
“I want to branch out. I want to write. I write poetry. I want to see my children grow up well.”
“I'm appalled the word feminism has been denigrated to a place of almost ridicule and I very passionately believe the word needs to be revalued and reintroduced with power and understanding that this is a global picture.”
“As a creative person, you just put something out into the consciousness of the society you live in.”
“I can't understand why the front pages of newspapers can cover bird flu and swine flu and everybody is up in arms about that and we still haven't really woken up to the fact that so many women in sub-Saharan Africa - 60 percent of people in - infected with HIV are women.”
“If we value what we've inherited for free - from other women - surely it's right morally and ethically for us to wake up and say, 'I'm a feminist. '”
“Feminism is a word that I identify with. The term has become synonymous with vitriolic man-hating but it needs to come back to a place where both men and women can embrace it. It is particularly important for women in developing countries.”
“Women's issues have always been a part of my life.”
“It's hard to tell how far women's individuality has come in the past twenty years.”
“Men need to understand, and women too, what feminism is really about.”
“Making a Christmas album is looked upon by some people as the thing you do when you are heading towards retirement.”