John Grant

My mother was a very sweet soul and a beautiful person, but she had a lot of fear.

I loved the whole New Romantic, New Wave thing... New Order, Soft Cell, Depeche Mode, Gary Numan, Blancmange, Yazoo.

Most of the bad things that have happened to me happened in Denver.

If I'm honest, I suppose there's something I don't want people to see in my eyes. They really are the window to the soul.

The only difficult thing is learning to recognise the interesting bits from those millions of moments life provides you with every day and writing down those snippets.

The thing is I don't feel like my story is special. I don't feel like it's different to anybody else.

Do you know the solo at the end of 'Why Don't You Love Me Any More?' that sounds like a chainsaw breaking through? That is what I can't do with my voice. That's when you hear how painful this has been to me.

I feel uncomfortable when I think about my father listening to my records, because I don't want to hurt him.

I don't want to leave the house, and I don't want to settle down.

Sometimes I wish I was one of those artists like David Bowie. They're not putting their private lives out there; it's about show and entertainment. But an alter ego is very dangerous for me. Because I am the guy who will become lost in that.

I think the humor, when applied in the right amount, only serves to intensify the other emotions in a given song; it highlights them, makes them stand out.

It's always been my goal to have backing singers.

There's an incredible amount of pain involved in being a human, but this humorous stuff is essential in overcoming it.

I seem to be very attracted to strong female personalities in acting and music.

I don't know about the totally happy album, though. I don't know if that will ever come from me.

If 'Queen Of Denmark' was about my childhood, then 'Pale Green Ghosts' is definitely about my adolescence, and that period was completely dominated by electronic music.

I can't create music if I'm wearing a mask and not being myself, and that was the problem with The Czars.

In order to not have to deal with being gay in the world, you have to control everything. You try and walk in an un-gay way so as not to be found out. You try to control every situation, check the people around you, that you're not in the wrong place, and that can be exhausting. It goes on for decades, and it becomes mental sickness.

If I had a good scream, like Frank Black, I'd be doing punk music, 'cos I love that.

I'm not a big punk fan, but I love a good, solid screamer.

I really do feel like music is the only thing that I can do.

I love a lot of different styles, but my heart belongs in electronic music.

I love patchwork quilts. But not in music.

The rejection I received when I was young for being a homosexual... that's nothing compared to the number you do on yourself when you've been taught that you are not a human like other people.

I'm very proud that I have learned German and Russian. Especially Russian, because of how difficult and beautiful it is and because of how much I struggled in the beginning to get my head around how it works.

I don't cry easily.

The 1980s were all about synths for me, and it never went away after that.

I can only live in the world of truth, inasmuch as I'm able to be truthful with myself at any given point, on any given day.

People have always painted me like a pessimist, like somebody who sees the glass half-empty. But I think the fact that I keep showing up and saying, 'No, there must be a way for me to live in this world,' that shows I'm an eternal optimist.

For me, every single thing I do seems to be about the process of letting go because that's what I so desperately need to do with so many things: with fear, with what people think of me, and all these things I've worried about my whole life.

When I came out, I found I hadn't been born with the right genes. It's quite brutal. If you're beautiful and you have the right genes, then the gay scene is a place where you can be worshipped. But if you don't, it's a different ball of wax.

Madeline Kahn is one of my favourite people in the entire world and one of the funniest. She was a talented Broadway star and also sang opera.

There's a lot of anger in 'Queen of Denmark,' and that's me getting political.

I had never considered myself a political guy, but there are certain things I can't shut up about. When I hear people say things like, 'If 'we' allow gays to marry, then people will want to marry animals and children,' I can't just stand there.

It's not like we wanted to talk about the fact that we're gay all the time, but the world has forced it to be an issue.

I spent many years trying to fit in and do things the way I thought I was supposed to - trying to be perceived the way I thought people wanted to see me. I grew up in a very religious household and wasn't taught to feel comfortable or good about my sexuality, so it feels great to be able to say things the way I want to say them.

I don't really listen to my old music.

I suppose my ideal brain food is learning languages.

You can only be you, and there are plenty of people out there who wouldn't have you be any other way.

The lead character in 'Adaptation' is pretty much me but with more talent. Every time I watch 'Adaptation,' I feel very emotional because it makes me be kinder to myself and see the human situation a little more clearly.

I've kept going to therapy to find out why my perspective is so skewered and why I'm filled with rage. It's so I can live in this world alongside these other people who seem to be what is desired and what the world wants.

I come from a position where it seems like I have an addictive quality to everything in my life.

I don't feel like I'm writing music for gay people. I'm a gay man who is writing music about one tiny little experience of what it's like to be a human on this planet.

When I write my songs, I'm writing about the pain, the joy, and the ridiculousness of being a human.

I feel like, in the Czars, for example, I was afraid. I couldn't express myself. I didn't have a connection to myself. That's one of the huge reasons why it was such a difficult existence. I put a lot of that on myself. I couldn't access myself. I couldn't look at myself, because I was too ashamed.

I have to strip away all the layers when I'm writing the song. I have to cut through all these layers of years of putting up walls and putting protective layers around myself.

The lion's share of what I listened to in the Eighties, what really affected me, was coming from Britain.

Being embraced by the British people is a beautiful compliment for me. It feels very special.

Reykjavik has a mixture of southern and northern mentality. There's a laid-back, relaxed attitude but also the feeling things are going to get done.

My music is definitely very personal. The songs are about moments, snapshots of everyday life, and about having one's say, or at least feeling like one has had one's say.