Quotes About Inspiration

I'm most proud of a couple of things. Firstly what we managed to do with the team from 2009 to get them to win the Ashes in Australia. That was remarkable. And secondly moving England forward in white-ball cricket because that is where the game is going and we need to be at the vanguard.

I went down to the prison in Menard, thinking we were the vanguard, but down there, I got down on my knees and listened and learned from the people.

In fashion, you're privileged because you're consistently working with a vanguard of youth.

Vanilla Ice sold ten million records. For him to be on MTV, it made me feel like it could be done.

If I see somebody dancing really well, it can make me want to dance. Or it could be the music. But perhaps the thing I miss the most is that when you're dancing, everyday concerns vanish. It's a unique world.

Leaders should lead as far as they can and then vanish. Their ashes should not choke the fire they have lit.

If you're concentrating so damn hard on a piece of mathematics or a musical - a piece of music or a piece of art, the restraint that holds the rest of - the rest of the world back off and vanishes in the rest of your life.

If I'm really rolling with a short story, I work on it everywhere and end up with a finished draft in a couple months, but a novel really demands that I step out of my life and vanish into the world of the book.

There have been times I've planted stuff in songs where four years later I'll be singing it from a subconscious, kind of chameleon little lizard mind... and at a certain moment, all of a sudden, I'll hear a line from a different vantage point and it'll change its meaning. It's something I wrote but it changed because I did.

For a writer, you definitely do not want to be in the mainstream. You want to be on the edge because that's where the vantage point is. That's where you can see.

When I became a father, I saw what passed for family entertainment. So much of it was vapid. I wanted to make things that mattered.

We don't like trends. We formed initially because we felt we had something of our own to say. What was happening was lacking in certain aspects - it needed a different point of view, a variant on things, but with the same attack, impact.

I'm really boring. I think about cooking all the time. I have a little book, so when I go out or see something, I jot it down and try to include it in a recipe or do a variation of it. I even have a notepad by my bed, which is usually saying we're running out of mango chutney.

I think with me and the type of music that I'm trying to make, it's always going be soulful because I grew up listening to different types and variations of soulful melodies and jazz, but experimenting with different types of stylistic souls.

Generally what I produce is new. Of course, they are often variations on the same subject.

To me I think artists in general make a statement - and for the rest of their lives - every album, every book - are variations on a theme.

I love making music. I love being involved in arranging music. It's very natural to know what I want to hear next and come up with ideas that are variations of what might be good.

My grandmother got me recordings of the 'Goldberg Variations,' in addition to the 'Brandenburg Concertos,' the Mozart string quartets and Beethoven's 'Seventh Symphony.'

I tend to write out the first iteration of a lyric here and then go over here and make variations on it, on the page opposite.

I rather envy writers who do variations on a theme. I like reading those books, but in practice, I can't do it.

I have a very varied taste in music from Boards of Canada to Radiohead. So I just love making music and being in the studio.

I admire the work of brilliant actresses such as Judi Dench, Maggie Smith and Helen Mirren, who have had such varied careers. They have never stopped working, and they are as great today as they ever were.

Each member of the band has varied influences, and the same diversity is reflected in our fanbase.

I like kind of varied songs, not just the same song all the time. And I thought things like 'Too Sentimental' is a different thing for us, but it works and we love the way they all came out. There's definitely varied songs on there.