Robert Plant

[On encountering the music of Umm Kulthum] I was intrigued by the scales, initially, and obviously the vocal work. The way she sang, the way she could hold a note, you could feel the tension, you could tell that everybody, the whole orchestra, would hold a note until she wanted to change.

No matter what we say, entertainers are usually quite insecure, wobbly characters underneath, and maybe that bit of glory or that bit of expression or whatever it is compensates in some area.

I was young when I first went to America. I was 19 years old, and I went crazy. I met The GTOs and my mind just snapped. I’m from a nowhere town in the Midlands and here were these girls with bare breasts blatantly coming on, and of course we went crazy.

I don’t think I’ve aged gracefully.

It may become Bob as time goes on. My dad was a Bob and his father was a Bob. That seems to be the sort of cheery thing that you do to octogenarians, but not yet, no.

When I was a kid, I’d be there in the stands thinking: ‘Come on Wolves, do it for me!’….And here I am again: ‘Come on Wolves,’ pleading with a borrowed laptop!

Part of being a sex symbol is very flattering and it does help you get success in the business – but only to a point. You’re stuck with that moniker forever, and it does cloud people’s imagination. They just can’t see you being able to do anything else.

I look like an angel, but I can play the bitch.

I was a mostly happy child, though I had a pretty rough puberty. Growing up as a girl is always traumatizing, especially when you have the deadly combination of greasy skin and getting your boobs at ten. But I think it’s good to grow up that way. It builds character.

I still want Oprah to play my best friend. I want to spend time with Oprah.

I’m a lot taller than I look on television and younger, and for the role of David Brent I wore a fat suit under my shirt and trousers. Really I’m about 25 and about 6′ 1 tall. So that’s probably why you don’t recognize me in the street.

Abstaining from sex had to zen my body. I ain’t giving, so don’t ask, I don’t lend my body. He gotta be king status to get in my body.

The thing about drugs and sex is that you lose all your inhibitions. I’ve had sex in trains, planes, wine bars… and quite a few car parks!

Roc Nation is such an incredible, unique team, especially in the music industry. Everyone genuinely loves and cares about each other.

Although it’s painful at the time, most of the things that people have said about us negatively – some of them are true and you can work on them, and the ones that you don’t agree with, you don’t work on.

I come from the tradition of a big Irish family that loves to sing. I love to perform.

Cocaine is God’s way of telling you you are making too much money.

A lot of them also looked a little further down the line in the future than we did. We always did everything out of Level Cross (N.C.) in the backyard and we were fairly successful with the thing. Then it started being a bigger and bigger business. It started going and bringing more people in, more money, more technology, that kind of stuff. We still sat there in the backyard. By the time we got ready to do something about it, we were so far behind on our money and our engineering and all that stuff it’s just taken us a little time to get going.

So when I come across as being everybody’s mate and nice and humble, I’m only nice and humble to a certain degree; the other side of me is arrogantly determined to do what the f**k I want.

I get more people approaching me about how good I was in ‘Napoleon Dynamite’ than being in Coldplay.

I don’t believe in perfection. I don’t think there is such a thing. But the energy of wanting things to be great is a perfectionist energy.