“I don’t think anyone ever plans to change line-ups, but it’s something that comes with being in bands. I was in a band once and there were always problems – members come and go – and some of the world’s biggest bands have changed line-ups loads!”

It’s probably the worst feeling in the world, when you’re deeply and madly in love with a woman and you know she’s not feeling you the same way, and you don’t know why.

You have to envision your life, and then go backwards.

I could sing you a thousand and one doo-wop songs. I love the simplicity in that music. It’s not super-poetic, it’s just from the heart.

I don’t like two stories. I like one story. I never grew up with stairs. I like to stick to what I know.

I don’t try and be dark, but there are obviously darker emotions that I want to capture sometimes.

When it’s your time, it is your time.

Treasure, that is what you are.

I think I don’t take myself too seriously. You know as far as, it’s a fun life. I take my music serious, but I like to have fun.

I think that success is having fun.

Every time I try to write a song, when I sit down and think I’m going to write, I really want to write a song, and it never works out. It’s always when it hits me unexpectedly on a plane or right before I go to bed, something like that.

To write a song you must have an imagination, to have an imagination you must be free.

If I was a billionaire, I’d be smart with my money.

Becoming famous was never what I wanted to do. There’s a lot of things that come with fame – it’s what people in the limelight have to do.

Songwriters, you have to work – you have to wait for residuals. You have to pray that the song’s going to be a hit. And then a year later, you might get a check.

People can hear my songs are coming from something real. I mean what I say; I’m not just writing to impress critics or young girls, or older girls. The way I talk is the way I write a song.

My dad was just the king of finding these little spots for us to stay that we should never have been staying at.

It’s harder starting over, than never to have changed.

Once social change begins, it cannot be reversed.

I get out, I get out of all your boxes. I get out, you can’t hold me in these chains. I’ll get out. Father free me from this bondage. Knowin’ my condition is the reason I must change

Your first and foremost job as a leader is to take charge of your own energy and then help to orchestrate the energy of those around you.

Only idiots refuse to change their minds.

The only ones who make things change are fanatics. If you’re not a fanatic around here, you can’t cut it.

The pessimist complains about the wind; the optimist expects it to change; the realist adjusts the sails.

Our elders said back then that if Black folks really wanted to see Change, they had to step up to the plate and do it themselves. Somebody has to be First. Will that be you?