I was jailed for using words that I still dispute. Anyone who's ever met me will tell you that I'm not a violent person.

I wrote a lot of lyrics in prison, but they'd all be like, 'Crawls upon the shoulders, hatred in the eyes.' I wrote about 50 songs in there that were all about jail. I've come out and thought, 'I've only served eight weeks; I can't really write a concept album about jail.'

I love harmonicas - old blues players like Sonny Boy Williamson.

We feel we're the only British group worth exporting since the Sex Pistols, definitely.

Everybody is a star. It's true. And if you've got a light, don't let it go out. 'Cos some people sink under.

I'd like to write songs for other people, see things from a different perspective. I'd like to watch things from the dugout instead of the pitch.

You'll never find a Manchester band slagging off another Manchester band, but within each Manchester band, people will rip each other apart: Mondays, Smiths, New Order, Roses, Oasis.

Even me mum can't tell me what to do.

I'm lucky enough to be one of them music makers who can do a dance festie or a rock festie.

One person might perceive me as godlike, and the next might think I'm a northern thug. I don't think I've done myself any favours... but I swear I've not had a proper fight since I was 14.

I like the fact that a group can become successful, and by way of what you are, you can show up all the other people who are around you.

When I was 9, I was into T. Rex, Gary Glitter, and Alice Cooper. I knew The Beatles because my nan introduced me to them, but T. Rex was the first band I got into myself. I got 'Metal Guru' a few months after hearing 'Children of the Revolution' in Pwllheli in North Wales at a market.

Oasis are okay, but they're like The Sun: base.

Some of the kids who discovered me from my 'F.E.A.R.' record or one of the U.N.K.L.E. tunes have said, 'I don't even like the Roses; I love your solo stuff.' I buzz off that.

It is a fact that everyone's got a limited run in music - but who's to say how long that run lasts? I used to think that there would be no way I'd still be in music when I was 40. I used to think anyone who was 40 was an old man, and they probably shouldn't be doing it anymore.

If you want to call me a Karaoke King, I'll take it.

I actually was able to give up shopping in February '99.

I give thanks for everything that's ever happened to me and for everything I've got.

Northern soul was huge in Manchester in the '70s and '80s; I went to a lot of all-nighters.

I love people, me, I believe in people. I love people too much.

I've not thought about the Stone Roses since we quit. How many LPs do I have to make to stop people talking about it?

Just because I'm a successful singer who's loved and has been loved for years doesn't mean I'm sitting behind electric gates in my own fantasy land.

I'm solo, and I love being solo. I believe I went through the Roses so I could become a solo music-maker. That's what I believe.

The Beatles were great; we know that. But we were trying to do a new thing. Why do we need to recreate the Sixties?

When the ravens leave the Tower, England shall fall, they say. We want to be there shooting the ravens.

I feel like I've established myself as a music maker in my own right.

When The Stone Roses first came out, the early reviews called me 'simian.' I had to look that up at the time.

I can't think of anyone who's reformed for art's sake. That's why the Roses will never reform.

We wrote 'Stellify' for Rihanna, but as we got to the end of writing it, I thought, 'You know what? I'm gonna keep this for myself. We'll give her another one.' She'd have probably sung it better, but it is too good for me not to do it.

With the Stone Roses, I always thought we'd be successful because we had some great songs.

We need to ban all air-freighted food. Carrots from Holland. Potatoes from Egypt. It's got to stop.

I spent the summer of '88 indoors, writing 'Shoot You Down,' 'Bye Bye Badman,' and 'Don't Stop.'

I've never chatted up a girl in me life. I've always let girls come to me. I've never approached a girl to chat her up.

People tend to settle for the fiver rather than going for the pot of gold.

I feel like the Ryan Giggs of music.

We're all anti-royalist, anti-patriarch. Cos it's 1989. Time to get real.

I am gentle. I think nearly everyone who makes music is sensitive - I don't care how hard they pretend they are.

I thought it would be more interesting to make a musical autobiography than an actual autobiography.

I don't actually personally get off on guitar music.

I like a lot of that Chicago stuff, house music.

It's a horrible name, Coldplay. It doesn't conjure up any positive thoughts.

I love karaoke - I usually do Blondie's 'Heart Of Glass,' or 'Try A Little Tenderness.'

I went to a friend's 40th in Manchester, and there was a karaoke machine, and no one was having a go. My mate said, 'No one's singing because you're in the room.' I said, 'Who am I, Frank Sinatra?' They made me sing flipping 'My Star' to a backing track that sounded like '80s Roxy Music. It was pretty embarrassing, but I did it.

Stardom's transitory. Nothing really changes except people's attitudes.

I used to be one of those kids who couldn't keep my mouth shut.

My sister bought me the Koran in 1990. I always thought the stories in it were magical.

I've always said prayers.

They've had a hard life, the Oasis brothers. They've done really well to be semi-normal. It's always sad when your dirty linen is brought out in public.

I was skint, and I had to move back to my mum and dad's house, back into the room I shared with my brother when I was a kid. I kept getting people on the streets telling me that they loved me; it didn't mean anything to me because I was still borrowing tenners off my pensioner father to go and get some chicken.

Getting a grey beard's not cool.