Brian Eno

“Although cover notes for classical music albums tend to say that the trill of flutes suggests mountain streams and so on, I don't think anybody listens to music with the expectation that they're going to be presented with a sort of landscape painting.”

“If you're in a forest, the quality of the echo is very strange because echoes back off so many surfaces of all those trees that you get this strange, itchy ricochet effect.”

“Sometimes you recognize that there is a category of human experience that has not been identified but everyone knows about it. That is when I find a term to describe it.”

“The artists of the past who impressed me were the ones who really focused their work.”

“I think one of my pursuits over the years is trying to answer the question of, 'What else can you do with a voice other than stand in front of a microphone and sing?'”

“When I started working on ambient music, my idea was to make music that was more like painting.”

“When our governments want to sell us a course of action, they do it by making sure it's the only thing on the agenda, the only thing everyone's talking about. And they pre-load the ensuing discussion with highly selected images, devious and prejudicial language, dubious linkages, weak or false 'intelligence' and selected 'leaks.'”

“I love good, loud speakers.”

“My shows are not narratives.”

“When I was young, an eccentric uncle decided to teach me how to lie. Not, he explained, because he wanted me to lie, but because he thought I should know how it's done so I would recognise when I was being lied to.”

“I enjoy working with complicated equipment. A lot of my things started just with a rhythm box, but I feed it through so many things that what comes out sounds very complex and rich.”

“What I believe is that people have many modes in which they can be. When we live in cities, the one we are in most of the time is the alert mode. The 'take control of things' mode, the 'be careful, watch out' mode, the 'speed' mode - the 'Red Bull' mode, actually. There's nothing wrong with it. It's all part of what we are.”

“I believe in singing.”

“I'd love it if American kids were listening to Muslim music.”

“The whole history of pop music had rested on the first person singular, with occasional intrusions of the second person singular.”

“Every collaboration helps you grow. With Bowie, it's different every time. I know how to create settings, unusual aural environments. That inspires him. He's very quick.”

“When I started making my own records, I had this idea of drowning out the singer and putting the rest in the foreground. It was the background that interested me.”

“I've discovered this new electronic technique that creates new speech out of stuff that's already there.”

“The point about melody and beat and lyric is that they exist to engage you in a very particular way. They want to occupy your attention.”

“I felt extremely uncomfortable as the focal point, in the spotlight. I really like the behind the scenes role, because all my freedom is there.”