Suzi Quatro

“As Mick Jagger will tell you, performing is an aerobic work-out. I've got the bass guitar, which is the heaviest of all the instruments, and I'm a little girl, in boiling-hot leather under the lights. You have to keep the fitness level up if you want to look good up there.”

“When I was seven, I decided to buy all my friends some ice cream, but the problem was where to get the money. Sneaking into church, I went to the side of the altar where you can light a candle for your loved ones and took the money from the collection boxes.”

“I'm told I'm an incredible flirt because I don't know I'm doing it. I don't want to even analyse it, but I seduce people, apparently; I suck them in.”

“Music has always been in my family, but it was mainly keyboards. I learned to play classical piano, but when I first heard the amazing bass guitar of James Jamerson, who played on all the big Motown hits of the '60s and '70s, I knew bass guitar was my instrument.”

“It sounds corny, but I consider myself an old-fashioned entertainer. I could have been in variety.”

“After moving to England I did some recording and eventually formed an English band, this was together for quite a few years with only a keyboard replacement. The band had no name, just my name.”

“The bass player's function, along with the drums, is to be the engine that drives the car... everything else is merely colours.”

“I didn't think I was going to change the world for women; I just did what I did. My big thing was that I didn't change who and what I was to become successful. I will not be told what to do; I'm a real independent girl.”

“I'm one of those rare breed of rock n' rollers with a brain, probably because the brain's still intact.”

“I made up my mind that I was going to be just like Elvis. It never occurred to me that Elvis was a man. I just wanted to be him. He had a huge impact on me, right down to that black leather jumpsuit he wore on the '68 Comeback Special.”

“When punk picked up black leather, I put it down.”

“I've always maintained that you can be sexy with your clothes on. Sexier maybe.”

“Bass guitar is the engine of the band.”

“I'm a bit of a wine snob and like a glass of Chateaux Margaux '82 with a meal or to unwind.”

“The bass should be the note of the bass drum, and then you've got the engine of the band that everything else builds on. Everything else, the guitar, the keyboards, is a colour.”

“I always found the road exciting. I liked stinking hotels and freezing dressing rooms.”

“I haven't talked to any young artists for a long time. But if we did sit down, I'd definitely tell them my viewpoint. If it was Lady Gaga, I'd say: 'You're talented, and you've obviously got the goods... what the hell are you doing with your image? How can anyone take you serious?'”

“I used to buy scented poetry books on tour and read aloud to the band. Not what you'd expect, huh?”

“Do as many gigs as the good Lord sends. That's the only true training.”

“This is just the way it goes: there's always a cycle with music - it goes up and it goes down, it goes risque and it goes back, it goes loud then it goes soft, then it goes rock and it goes pop.”