“I really hate bureaucracy and the idea that I’m not a free person.”

I just really want to make albums – and however I can, I will.

I’d say that, first and foremost, I’m a performer; I started performing when I was four years old, and being on stage from a young age set me up.

Curvy is something to be proud of.

It’s tragic that you can define a whole movement in music by gender alone. People are like, ‘Oh, look, another quirky girl.’

I think soul is soul. I don’t see new soul as any different to old soul.

I agree with cosmetic surgery for medical reasons – my mother had breast cancer and I think it’s very sad when somebody has no choice in what happens to their body.

I dread the idea of a paparazzi snapping me while I’m out running.

It’s celebrated in British culture to be eccentric.

Sometimes people fear the truth. They’d rather not speak to you than know what you really think.

I love going to the cinema. Whenever I get time off, that’s where I go.

There’s nothing wrong with a thick eyebrow; Frida Kahlo had them.

I’m under no illusion that there are things about me that I’d like to change. I just accept who I am, and I’m proud of it.

All creative people have to have vulnerability because those nuances are what move people. So I’m deeply insecure – but I’m good at hiding it.

I try to stick to a certain diet all the time, and then when I feel like a reward, I have it. I try to stick to no dairy, no sugar, no wheat.

I’m not a pop act, churning stuff out really quickly. I find the music that arises from that style of working is distracted, not particularly profound.

I feel quite fearless protecting the people I love.

A holiday isn’t a holiday, without plenty of freedom and fun.

He always pictured himself a libertarian, which to my way of thinking means “I want the liberty to grow rich and you can have the liberty to starve”. It’s easy to believe that no one should depend on society for help when you yourself happen not to need such help.

This is the story of America. Everybody’s doing what they think they’re supposed to do.

The life my people want is a life of freedom. I have seen nothing that a white man has, houses or railways or clothing or food, that is as good as the right to move in the open country and live in our fashion.

Liberty, not communism, is the most contagious force in the world.

Do what you want to try doing. Take whatever you get out of it and have fun.

Sugar free? With the name Sugarpova I don’t think I will be doing anything sugar free very soon.

I believe that when I am dead, I am dead. I believe that with my death I am just as much obliterated as the last mosquito you and I squashed.