Benjamin Clementine

I'm literally nowhere yet... When things started going well, this French designer called Ami gave me some shoes and clothes to wear. But when I sat down to play the piano, the very new shoes kept slipping off the pedal. So I took them off, threw them away, and have never worn shoes while playing the piano from then on.

I didn't blend well with my classmates or my teachers.

People say my world is dark. No, there's a lot of lightness in my world. But I know very well that I'm not normal when I'm performing.

I personally wouldn't want my second album to sound like my first; it might sound very rocky or hard rock - and that wouldn't be melancholy. So if people think my music is melancholic, then so be it. It's meant to be uplifting, and I'm just basically saying what needs to be said.

Studying music involves a lot of mathematics and a lot of exercises of memory. Or you've got to be able to be like somebody, to play like somebody, to play Mozart's music the way he played it and how he intended it. You've got to make it perfect, and that's not what I want to do. Although it is beautiful.

I don't think I'm a singer, I think I'm an expressionist. But it takes time to put it in people's minds that this guy is not singing, 'Baby, I want to have you.' This guy is actually thinking about what he's saying. This guy has something to say.

We always blame other people when things go wrong. For example, family to friends, you think they'll stay by your side, and you realise they never do. But that's life.

I'm from a middle class family, but my father squandered all the money, so I didn't really run around with rich people.

I never thought I'd say this, but to any child listening, the world is your oyster.

Not all families stay together.

At home and in church - which I didn't go to a lot, I was very rebellious, but my family was strict Christians - they would ask us, 'What's the shortest verse in the Bible?' and I was the one who always said 'John 11:35' straightaway. It stayed with me: the Bible has stayed with me.

I dedicate all my time to music. And I'm glad that it's paying off in some ways.