Quotes from Johnny Flynn

We had no money, my dad was out of work a lot, and we never owned a house. It was very hand-to-mouth.

The reason I stopped music for a while and concentrated on theatre was that it was more conducive to parenting; having the days free was quite handy. I love them both. I hope I don't have to compromise one for the other.

I'm not a fan of taking too long in the studio. I always do one vocal take and jump out of the control room, and people push me back in... It's a real turn-off to hear things that are too polished. I feel like I've almost fought for the right to be that kind of musician - we used to be on a major label, and now we're on an indie.

Bob Dylan has and Einstein had their own way of perceiving the universe and translating it for us.

Music always gets bumped until I have some time to get around to it.

Folk music - and what people are now perceiving as being folk music - is music that's quite close to the ground. The songs sound quite old, even if they're new. They sound like they've been sung by different people for years.

I think Bob Odenkirk is phenomenal.

It's great being an actor and being part of a play or a film where there's usually quite a big group of people who are collaborating, and your job is really to fit in and share that energy. With music, because I write the songs, it's a broader, more abstract process.

Certain films should only be watched at 40,000 feet. Like, certain comedies and certain, uh, emotionally charged movies.

A lot of the work I've done has involved playing quite sympathetic characters.

I think the two are kind of synonymous for me; songwriting is like my form of diary making. It's how I process the world. Without doing that, I feel kind of lost. The characters that I play often come out in the songs and the challenges that they face, albeit in an abstract way.

I'm not that politically educated.

I'm a huge David Hockney fan.

I'm not really interested in myself in my writing. I can't see myself in the songs, even though I know different parts of me are there.

I just said, casually, 'You know, I passed up on auditioning for Einstein.' And my friend was like, 'You idiot, you have to do it!' She made me do it. I sent the tapes off assuming that somebody would say, 'Ha ha, very funny.'

I played trumpet for Noah and the Whale a couple of times.

I imagine that, for most people, acting isn't something they think is a viable option, whereas for me, it was the most viable option. No adults around me knew how to do anything else.

I feel really lucky that I somehow have blagged my way into loads of different experiences. I find making a film fascinating, I find making a play amazing, and working with my band and scoring things... it's all really cool. I'm just a glutton for experience, really.

I take them both seriously - I don't particularly want to be an 'actor-musician.' I want to play the great challenging parts, to be right for the part, rather than just, 'Oh, he can play the fiddle.'

My thing about demos is that you usually prefer them to the finished thing.

Taking someone else's language and fitting it into your own speech - you learn a lot about other people's brains, doing that.

If you're trying to do something wholly new, it's hard to fully trust it. But if you use forms that have come before, it lends your music weight and authority. It's also a way to acknowledge that it's not just you who's feeling these things. The emotions are coming through you from a whole history.

You might as well acknowledge what came before, because you can never do something wholly new. It's not unoriginal to make your references clear.

Westminster politics is very unattractive, and people are channelling political energy into more inward questioning - there are a lot of musicians whose songs are all about feeling, and it's almost like that's the only safe place to express yourself.