Quotes from Jean-Michel Jarre

Bands like Kraftwerk and Tangerine Dream, who I respect, have a very robotic, dehumanised approach. They're almost an apology for machines. It's very German.

Back in the Seventies, we had a romantic, poetic vision of the future, like it was in the movie '2001: A Space Odyssey.' It felt as if everything was still ahead of us.

I had no precise plan when I started 'Electronica,' but I think it has been a very positive journey for me.

Some collaborators might join forces in certain cities or special concerts. I'm excited to share the stage with some prestigious people that I love and respect.

My first synthesizer was the VCS3. I got it in Bristol in the late Sixties, long before Pink Floyd used them. I had to sell an acoustic guitar and an old reel-to-reel tape recorder to raise the money. You can do fantastic things with modern computers, but you cannot use them in the same intuitive, spontaneous way you can a VCS3.

I would say to anyone starting out that if their priority in life is happiness, then don't be a musician.

I just had one occasion in my life when suddenly my private life was everywhere, and that was an accident and beyond my control.

Even if we artists are all very privileged, there's a constant frustration about how to do more or better, and never being satisfied.

I wanted to create a bridge between experimental music and pop.

The paradox is that Mark Zuckerberg, Steve Jobs, and all the tech giants are bigger fans of music than some of the executives working at major record companies.

I wanted to find a bridge between Musique Concrete, electro-acoustic music, and proper rock music.

At the time, 'Oxygene' was considered a totally 'far out' concept... What was 'in' at the time was disco, hard-rock, and the early days of punk... and moreover, 'Oxygene' was instrumental. And I was French!

Pursuing music eats into your life to the point where there is no space left for anything else. You are lucky if you find a partner who is able to understand that, but even then, they will only understand it for a while, and then things get - you know, difficult.

When I first heard Kraftwerk, I thought they were an American band singing in German.

My father and I never really achieved a real relationship. We probably saw each other 20 or 25 times in our lifetime.

Dance fascinates me, and it is perhaps the most enriching audio-visual realm for a musician. Film-making also fascinates me.

It's sometimes better to have a father figure to rebel against than nothing, than just a black hole or an absence.

I want the Dead Sea, like Masada, to be part of UNESCO's world heritage.

My mother, who was in the Resistance in the Second World War, passed away at 96, and it was like she was 60. I almost have to apologise for my genes.

I was always interested in mixing experimentation with pop music, and Brian Eno, Kraftwerk, Tangerine Dream - we were all doing it at the same time, just very isolated from each other, all in our different cellars, in different worlds, without the Internet - underground in every sense.

What may not have value to you today may have value to an entire population, entire people, an entire way of life tomorrow. And if you don't stand up for it, then who will?

Technology does not always rhyme with perfection and reliability. Far from it in reality!

I collect robots. They're mainly Japanese, American, and especially Russian - small robots, big robots, and old toy robots made between 1910 and the Fifties.

I did the first 'Oxygene' on an 8 tracks tape recorder with very few instruments, with no other choice than being minimalist.