When you're 14 and you're with your friends, you laugh about really stupid stuff, but as you get older, the laughter inside you dies. When you're older, you need a bit of help.

There's a little pond near my house, and I see two swans there all the time who are obviously in love. But they look like the same bird, so I don't know if they're male or female, but they're definitely in love.

My mum and dad are both really funny. My granddad's really funny. My uncle's really funny. Everyone's really funny. You have to be quick; otherwise, you get roasted. Everyone takes the piss quite a lot. You have to be really sharp.

I've been writing the show with Nigel Coan, the director of 'Luxury Comedy', and Tom Meeten. Three's good. With two, you can lock horns a bit. On your own, you're not sure whether what you've made is any good. I don't know how people write novels. I would go mad.

I've never been to Hawaii. It looks amazing.

I think I'm constantly surprised that adults can't deal with illogical things or thing that are weird or psychedelic. I've never really lost that.

Reality depresses me. I need to find fantasy worlds and escape in them.

I used to wear this cowboy outfit. I wouldn't take off. It was ridiculous. My mum was like, 'You've got to take that off sometime,' and I was like, 'No way, this is it.' It was the '70s - it was turquoise and yellow, really psychedelic colors. I wanted to be a psychedelic cowboy.

I've always had a good imagination. If I saw a sitcom, and everything was made out of cheese, I wouldn't go 'What?' I wouldn't get angry. I'd think, 'Right, OK, all cheese? Amazing.'

The combination of us two was a once-in-a-lifetime thing. You meet someone, and you just work, you have chemistry on stage, and writing.

I believe in fate. I didn't set out to be a comedian at first. I'm still not sure if I am or not.

In television, there are so many things between you making a joke and the audience seeing it. It's like an assault course.

I still feel about 22. I don't understand, actually. I mean, as I got older, I thought there would be things like, 'I need a house now', 'I need kids', 'I need a licence to drive', but I have never really had that happen. I guess that forms part of my appeal for the people who like the stuff I do: I'm not a real person - I'm a gypsy.

I bought two sculptures of two baboons called Lord and Lady Muck on an antique piece of furniture from an art exhibition, and it was quite expensive. It was very expensive, actually - way too expensive.

I loved being a man-woman. It's much more interesting than being one or the other.

I love the Marx Brothers.

Comedians are ridiculously oversensitive, so, especially with the Internet, you feel everything, like a spider on a web going, 'Oh God, I'm getting stomped'.

The trouble is, the older you get, it's hard to find time to make a film: it's a year to write, a year to get money, a year to make it, a year to edit. It's four years of your life.

A lot of people think I must be like Vince Noir. He's a bit like a child. He doesn't have any malice. He's even friendly to monsters. I am like that, I guess. I talk to anyone.

I hate recycling. I don't think it exists. I think they've made it up to give people jobs. They deliver these stupid little Tupperware boxes and tell me, 'You're not using your recycling box!' Who are they? They're not the police.

Fame is like being at a party and getting invited into the cool room even the VIPs can't get into, then the even cooler, more exclusive room after that. Eventually, you end up in a cubicle on your own, asking, 'Am I having fun?'

I guess standup is really painting pictures with words - especially for me, as I describe quite fantastical, visual things. My art teacher, Dexter Dalwood, always seemed to think they were linked. We bonded over our love of Vic Reeves.

The film-maker Alejandro Jodorowsky - his films are hard to watch - they're so dense and rich - but they're probably the best things ever made. And Spike Milligan, who was light years ahead of the rest - I played some of his stuff to Jack Black once. He'd never heard of him, so watching him listen to Spike for the first time was just hilarious.

When people come to see you, they know what you do. That's what they want. They want it to be quite English; they don't want to watch an English bloke trying to fit in. They want it to be quintessentially English in the way that Ricky Gervais is rude to people at the Golden Globes.

I always had a sort of niggling regret that we didn't come do stuff in America.

I'd rather do smaller theaters, because it's more fun for the audience and more fun for me. I like to build up demand.

The Boosh was cult, but then it crossed over a bit, which we needed it to, because we were working on it full time, and it needed to go mainstream so we could keep making material.

I can't write unless I've got the voice for a character.

When I was at art college, a can of Spray Mount adhesive cost £12: £2 more than my weekly food bill.

My parents had lots of parties. They were hopelessly bohemian. They were just 18 when they had me.

My mum and dad are massive Bowie fans, so I grew up listening to his music.

When we got quite big and were generating a lot of money through the arenas, we became quite a big thing, and a lot of managers appeared, and it became a big machine, like we were in Pink Floyd or something, and I don't think we were into that. We didn't really compromise.

I don't live to work; I work to live.

I'm not interested in making money. It's just that with my talent, I'm cursed with it.

Great music is in the ear of the beholder.

We're not arrogant, we just believe we're the best band in the world.

Rock n' roll to me is all about freedom of thought and to be whatever you want to be.

You've got to be strong enough for love. It's very easy to be cool and cynical. It's very difficult to just let yourself go and be in love. You've got to be strong enough for that.

The charts are only relevant when you're top of them!

With every song that I write, I compare it to the Beatles. The thing is, they only got there before me. If I'd been born at the same time as John Lennon, I'd have been up there.

Music is a thing that changes people's lives. It has the capacity to make young people's lives better.

To be quite honest, John Lennon had questionable politics. There was a flip side. He was all peace and love, but he was a very violent character.

My wife would say I'm not romantic at all, but I would say that I'm the ultimate romancer because I write about... life being brilliant.

You can't put a load of rockstars up on a stage and expect to wipe out global poverty. That's ludicrous.

I go into Daunt Books in Marylebone every couple of weeks. My wife Sara demolishes books, but I only buy stuff occasionally. I like boys' things, spies and the Cold War.

You've just got to trust your instincts and realize that you can't please all the people all the time. You've got to please yourself ultimately in the end.

You'll find people who rib you about their age are petrified about getting old. It doesn't bother me.

Solo artists are generally totally insane. Elton John? Slightly eccentric. George Michael? He's mad as custard.

My first instinct when I write songs is not a negative one. It's something positive... Everything I've ever done has some form of hope in it, I think.

You can't afford to think about what might have been. You just be aware of what is.