I always take a teapot with me on tour. I suppose it's only natural that I've just written a song called 'Where Would We Be Without Tea?'
— Gilbert O'Sullivan
When the magazines talk about artists they talk about the Paul McCartneys, the Paul Simons, they never talk about me. So their readers and contemporary artists are never going to check me out because they're not reading about me.
I'm not a great socialiser. Nor am I a red carpet person.
My motto is, 'You may not be as good as you think you are, but thinking you are is good.'
I must be the only artist whose image was hated by everybody.
I didn't come into the music business to make money. I came into it to be a success. Of course, if you're successful, you'll earn money and I was happy to receive it.
I've only recorded my own songs. I don't consider myself a great singer, so I wouldn't be comfortable interpreting other people's songs.
I love writing and I just sit at my keyboard and write.
Some artists say 'Don't categorize me.' I'm saying 'You can't categorize me.'
The Beatles changed everything . I knew I couldn't compete, couldn't be as cool, so I went completely the other way.
I never wanted global fame you know.
I quite like the idea of performing in front of people that don't like me.
I don't trust anybody.
Song writing is very serious; it is hard.
I feel every time I have 12 good songs for a new album, I am in with a chance to compete with the big boys. As long as I have that attitude, it's healthy.
Technology has very little to do with what I do. I have a purpose built studio but all I need for writing is my piano and a cassette recorder as I still use cassettes.
I've always been a bit of a loner.
My Norwegian wife Aase was a Pan Am stewardess back in the Seventies when we met. She was very attractive, and we became good friends, but I was travelling a lot and she was jetting back and forth across the Atlantic, so it was a while before we got together.
What I can't understand is why people still won't give me the credibility that I look for. If Mojo or any other of those magazines would give me the credit for only ever performing my own songs rather than someone like Rod Stewart singing other people's songs looking for success.
I have quite a strong self-belief.
When it comes to my songs I'm confident. Back in 1967, I would go to a publisher's office, and tell them they just had to listen to my music.
At college I had a Saturday job in a hardware store and I got #1. When I came to London in 1966 and lived in a bedsit, I got a temporary job as a salesman in a C&A store. I don't know what I earned: enough to pay the rent, I imagine. Then, in 1967'68, I worked as a postal clerk for #10 a week.
I was one of six children, brought up by my mother in Swindon after my father died. We had all we needed - food on the table, clothes to wear. When I wanted a drum kit, my mother got me one. When I got into playing guitar, I came down one Christmas or birthday and there was a guitar for me. It amazes me how Mum managed to do it.
Lennon and McCartney became great songwriters because they were prepared to listen to and learn from all types of music.
I've never had writer's block.
Doing the Best I Can' is a sure fire hit. Incredibly commercial. But what could you say about it? Catchy and good to dance to. But 'Nothing Rhymes' is different. A much bigger risk but it was lyrics people could talk about. So that was the one to launch me on.
The way I do that is to keep coming up with good songs and when I do a concert, I make sure I give a good performance. It's not rocket science.
I couldn't live without Radio 1. They condemned me to oblivion, but they're what I grew up with.
I see myself in competition with Blur and Oasis. But everyone else just sees me as this guy with a history.
Nothing Rhymed,' my first single in England, was a nice ballad, which I thought would sound like a songwriter typical of the day - denim, jeans, long hair, early 20s.
To be successful to me meant to have a hit record in England. I never looked outside England.
What I would hate to go through is what happened in the mid-90s playing in front of a half-empty theatre, which prompted me to say 'never again' when it came to Waterford. To go through that again in any of the places I call home would destroy me.
I don't like people who make records and then don't ever perform. If you are going to make a record it's important you get out there so people can see you if they want to and get to hear you if they want to.
I like conflict in songs.
I couldn't live without tea. I have two cups in the morning, one at lunch, two in the afternoon and one in the evening - Assam with milk and sugar. It has to be leaf tea - no bags - and drunk from a china cup.
I'm very much a home bird. I sometimes think I should have been a domestic. I like sweeping up, getting everything tidy. I'm obsessive compulsive. I don't mind admitting it.
I was a big fan of Buster Keaton and Charlie Chaplin.
I'm basically as shy a person as I was when I once worked in an office in London in the late Sixties. I like my own company. I didn't need a lot of friends.
The measure of success was writing a song, recording it and for it being in the hit parade in England. Success was about the postman walking up the garden whistling my song. I wasn't trying to conquer the world.
As you get older you lose interest in what you hear on the radio. But you can't be like that, you have to enjoy what's going on.
It's all very well making records, but the joy of performing is that you get to meet people who give you instant feedback.
I always tell people that I went through long hair. I was a typical art school scruff. It was good then.
I'd love to see myself on sale in shops. It tickles me, does the idea of me being marketed.
When I started out I thought just hearing one of my records on the radio would be magical. Fortunately, that naivety has always stayed with me. Because when you've had massive success and it tapers off people lose interest in you. So you have to work even harder to generate interest.
The quality of my songs will get through to people. They are good songs. Lyrically, some of them are interesting: there's stories, a bit of humour. I'm very confident about the music I play, you know.
It's very easy to think about rhymes and just usage of words that sound good but don't mean anything. Basically, I try to put into song the way people actually talk.
I thought my singing and songwriting were good, but nothing different. Then you're presented with this picture image that contradicts the impression you get from listening to the record.
It is ironic that losing makes you more liked than winning.
I never complete a song until I'm actually going to make a record.
The writing is everything of course but you can't be making records and not be willing to go out there and perform.
