Katie Melua

"Its so funny because when you do smoke weed and write a song, youre like, Yeah, this is brilliant, this is excellent! - and the next morning you go back and often find that really its not very good at all... Ive never done anything like acid or cocaine and I hope I dont. But I guess you have to try things once in a while... just once. I think you have to be very wary of falling into that trap of getting addicted."

"I think I am easy to make fun of. I try not to pay too much attention. You cant let critics dictate what you do... The thing that fascinates me, is the emotion in music, the way it can make me cry or laugh or be angry. Im not trying to be hip or cool, and Im not scared to put everything I have into songs. Passion is the greatest thing that music can evoke. We live in a society where I think people often find it hard to express themselves, but sometimes a song can do that for you. It might not be groundbreaking, but there is something about the simplicity of presenting songs where its all about the lyric and the melody. People dont need to get through a whole lot of production to get to the root of the song. Its just music doing what music does best... A lot of things in the mainstream are repetitive and soulless and have been churned out without any real conviction. It is really unfair to call Coldplay insufferable, when they obviously care about what they do. James [Blunt] too. Too much of the music industry is controlled by lawyers and businessmen, making music like its a product on the factory line. Thats what I call insufferable."

"The last verse [In My Secret Life] completely got to me, about how we all have great ideals but in reality we end up conforming, following everyone else. We want to be stronger so we lead that life inside, thinking of ourselves as these great brave souls. I literally thought when I was 15 that I was a musical genius and I could change the world, but in fact youre not and you cant and you dont, and that realisation is almost heartbreaking."

"Of course [Kate Bush] is still relevant. I wasnt actually in the country when her music first came out, so I only discovered it three or four years ago. Whats amazing is that something like "Wuthering Heights" still sounds so different. I actually saw her about nine months ago, we were just passing at an industry event and I went up to her and said I was a big fan and asked her about the new record. She was really excited about it but quite nervous because she felt that everyone was hyping it up a bit and she just wanted to bring out an album. You know, shes a musician."

"I dont think I could see myself with someone whos famous. I dont like the lifestyle and everything it stands for. Too superficial. That attention is too much. For me to go home and be surrounded by that sounds like a fucking nightmare. But a musician or someone whos into music is different."

"I get guilty when I spend money on silly things like clothes and stuff... Having experienced a completely different extreme of wealth, and I dont mean me being poor or rich, I mean knowing that 40 quid that gets spent on a pair of shoes could go a long way for a family in Georgia for a week or even a month, having experienced that, youre a bit more [guilty]."