Elton John

“When I say I don't have to write pop songs anymore, there's no way I'm going to get on the radio at 60 years of age unless I'm doing a duet with Gaga or I was on 'All of the Lights,' which was a Kanye West record that managed to get on the radio.”

“When your persona begins to take over your music and becomes more important, you enter a dangerous place. Once you have people around you who don't question you, you're in a dangerous place.”

“I've always wanted to smash a guitar over someone's head. You just can't do that with a piano.”

“I do like my rock stars to be a little larger than life. I don't mind the earnest ones at all, but I do like a bit of individuality.”

“People with HIV are still stigmatized. The infection rates are going up. People are dying. The political response is appalling. The sadness of it, the waste.”

“I am the most well-known homosexual in the world.”

“Music has healing power. It has the ability to take people out of themselves for a few hours.”

“Well, as I was saying... everyone's so nice to me, usually.”

“Well, I'm a huge fan of Ryan Adams, who's from North Carolina. And he's beginning to break really quite big.”

“I mean, in some cases with libel laws, you know, they can write things about people who have no course of action, because they can't afford to take legal action against them.”

“There's a lot of hate in the world.”

“At heart I've always been a music fan. That part of me has never changed since I was a little kid, sitting in a room watching a record go round, looking at the colour of the labels.”

“Because, I figured that, because I was a successful man, I was wealthy, I was, you know, seemingly intelligent - even that I am not intelligent enough to ask for help.”

“I went to a mixed school and I can't remember being bullied at school, ever. I was quite large, in those days. Usually, if you're going to be a bully, you'll pick on someone who is small. I didn't bully anybody, and I don't remember being bullied.”

“I'm so proud to be on a Kate Bush record; she's always marched to the beat of her own drum.”

“An agent is a person who is sore because an actor gets 90% of what they make.”

“I hate to say this, but I always listen to the music and the instrumentation first, and then grab on to the lyrics later.”

“The worst thing you can do to a child, and I've seen it happen so many times, is the silver spoon.”

“Once I'd heard 'Modern Times' by Bob Dylan, it really changed the way I wanted to make records.”

“I could never go onstage in denims.”