Quotes from Ian Brown

When you live in Manchester and it's raining every day, you've got to imagine the sun sometimes. When you're brought up in concrete, you aim for the green leaves. And when you get to the green leaves, you yearn again for concrete.

I gave it up three weeks before my black belt, foolishly. I got to my third brown belt and must have trained for 18 months but never went for it. I was nearly 18 and got this thing in my head about, ' Who are they to grade me?' Trying to be a rebel when I should have done it. It's my only regret, not going for a black belt.

Stardom's transitory. Nothing really changes except people's attitudes.

The Beatles were great; we know that. But we were trying to do a new thing. Why do we need to recreate the Sixties?

Every time I do interviews, they ask me about the same things - poverty, war, and the power of the church.

The jails are full of kids from kids' homes. You're 16 years old, and you're out on the street. How you going to fend for yourself at 16 if you've not had an education? You're going to turn to crime.

People have to realise you don't help African children singing along to 60-year-old men playing their tunes from 40 years ago.

I started doing karate when I was 11.

If you want to call me a Karaoke King, I'll take it.

My sister bought me the Koran in 1990. I always thought the stories in it were magical.

Honestly, going solo is the second best thing that's ever happened to me after my kids.

I'm solo, and I love being solo. I believe I went through the Roses so I could become a solo music-maker. That's what I believe.

I've got six solo albums. I've been round the world three times. I don't even think about the Roses.

You're never going to improve on a Michael Jackson song if you cover it.

Some of the kids who discovered me from my 'F.E.A.R.' record or one of the U.N.K.L.E. tunes have said, 'I don't even like the Roses; I love your solo stuff.' I buzz off that.

One thing I've always loved and rated me dad for is that, because of him, I've never seen the Queen's Christmas speech.

Even me mum can't tell me what to do.

With the Roses, I knew we were great; I felt that we would achieve something. On my own, I had no idea.

Everybody is a star. It's true. And if you've got a light, don't let it go out. 'Cos some people sink under.

Since we were kids, we grow up believing that astronauts are heroes - that to go up in a rocket is a heroic thing. These guys are bigger than movie stars. To me, it's... all a well-dressed-up lie, basically. There's billions spent on rockets up there, and there's millions starving down here. It don't make sense to me.

Northern soul was huge in Manchester in the '70s and '80s; I went to a lot of all-nighters.

They've had a hard life, the Oasis brothers. They've done really well to be semi-normal. It's always sad when your dirty linen is brought out in public.

I always loved Oasis because when they came out, they did express that they loved us, and they saw that we did it, and they thought they could do it, too.

You'll never find a Manchester band slagging off another Manchester band, but within each Manchester band, people will rip each other apart: Mondays, Smiths, New Order, Roses, Oasis.