"Once you lose the weight, you're really anxious to eat healthy."

"My mother was a jazz fanatic and she wanted me to play the piano so I could play jazz tunes. I wish I had learned but I was too busy getting into trouble!"

"I'm not a bourgeois person, never will be."

"They said that Etta James is still vulgar. I said, Oh, how dare them say I'm still vulgar. I'm vulgar because I dance in the chair. What would they want me to do? Want me to just be still or something like that? I've got to do something."

"But then I go through long periods where I don't listen to things, usually when I'm working. In between the records and in between the writing I suck up books and music and movies and anything I can find."

"My mom listened to the Beatles and Elvis, a lot of different types of music."

"My music appeals in America. There is less of the purist criticism I get here. And to be a hit in the U.S... what singer doesn't have that dream?"

"Only by learning to live in harmony with your contradictions can you keep it all afloat."