I've had a wordless phase, and that's still not entirely over: what I sing is not always literally meant that way, and you can hear that in the way it is sung.

You feel the music needs something but you don't know what. So you start searching, fitting, measuring, trying. Every time you try another angle. And sometimes that's frustrating, especially if you don't come up with something for three days.

Let's get one thing straight: there's no such thing as the Bristol sound.

I thought I had a clear picture of death, but now I know it's a mystery and it will always be a mystery, although it is something we all have in common: everybody knows that life ends with death.

Most of the lyrics are over a year old, and it doesn't feel like it's about me. Time created a distance.

The music comes first. When Geoff has made something the inspiration comes automatically. His music is very expressive. But still is is a very difficult process: I have to add something to his music, not push it away. It has to be equal, and I find that very difficult.

I've had a wordless phase, and that's still not entirely over: what I sing is not always literally meant that way, and you can hear that in the way it is sung.

There's not only emotion in the way you sing but also in what you sing. That way I can compensate it.

We're thinking about printing the lyrics with the next record so that people can find their own meaning in them. But then they would start having a life of their own, and I think the Portishead music should stay a whole in which the lyrics come second, actually.

I am a very sensitive person, very impulsive and emotional.

I still don't like doing interviews. I hardly do any... I hope this will be the last one for a long while.

I think that after a year of Portishead I've become a little more sober.

I try to imagine how we would live if we didn't know we were going to die. Would we live our lives differently? Less careful, maybe? Less scared? These are beautiful things to think about and build a song around.

I've just put my heart and soul in a song and need at least a week to recover.

Wilderness touches the heart, mind and soul of each individual in a way known only to himself.

Only the elites despise earning money.

You don't ever earn a right to stop doing anything if you feel there is an obligation to move in terms of public service.

Yes, stop your beliefs for a few moments now and then and Be-Life.

I started noticing how stained the pavements are in London. The pavements in Beverly Hills aren't used; in London, they're used for everything. It doesn't matter how much they're cleaned, they still reflect light.

I really do think VR is now one of the most exciting things that can be done in this whole sector of consumer electronic entertainment stuff.

I'm not a great lover of Madonna's voice. She's done very well with what she's got, and I'm sure my voice turns her right off, but she's not my favourite singer.

I grew up around a lot of aggressive guys. My parents used to take me to AA meetings when I was very young. So I know aggression, I know insanity.

Look around. There are no enemies here. There's just good, old-fashioned rivalry.

I dont want to die without any scars.

I was doing a late-night round as a milkman in 1978 when I heard a radio DJ announce that he was leaving. I marched straight to the radio station and told them I could do better. For some reason, they gave me a go.

Birds are a miracle because they prove to us there is a finer simpler state of being which we may strive to attain.

It isnt how much time you spend somewhere that makes it memorable its how you spend the time.

When I represent Team GB, I never give less than 100 per cent. It is an absolute honour.

If you are African, the more educated you are, the less chances you have of getting a job.

I like the idea of working in different genres and transcending genres and hopefully finding success, and ultimately make movies people like.

To complain is always nonacceptance of what is.

Everyone, real or invented, deserves the open destiny of life.

Music is a really great creative tool for me, for different roles.

I no longer shall tinker with the machinery of death.

I'm such an action movie junkie that as an action fan, because action scenes are so heightened, we could never really picture ourselves in that scene. So when you're watching an action movie, you experience an action movie more outside of the aquarium: you know you're out of the aquarium looking in at all the swimming fish that are in there.

I love working for a company full of geeks.

Grief is the midwife of your capacity to be immensely grateful for being born.

To understand Mozart's contradictory qualities would indeed be to understand genius.