DEBBIE HARRY

I turned on VH1 this morning just to get a little warm-up before I came over here, and I think it's just terrific. There's so much great stuff: diverse and wonderful music, good performances, great looking girls, great videos, the whole thing.

It's amazing to me to see how bands evolve and how they take all their influences and come up with their own sound.

If I were to do a foundation, it would be to promote solar energy. And I'm worried about drilling for oil. I think it is harming the earth, 'cos it drains the layer of oil under the surface, and that could be causing earthquakes. It's like we're giving the earth arthritis. I don't know if that sounds crazy.

I guess people assume I have some sort of totally magical life, but I'm a working musician, fortunately. I've worked on my craft, and I'm very fortunate I've been able to survive in a very competitive industry and enjoy my success. It's not easy.

I don't mind if my skull ends up on a shelf as long as it's got my name on it.

I always say the new album is the best one yet. I always feel that - I really do, because it's the latest and it's the newest and it's a little bit better.

The word 'iconic' is used too frequently - an icon is a statue carved in wood. It was shocking at first, when I got that reference. It was a responsibility, and it's impossible to live up to - you're supposed to be dead, for one thing.

I love the ACLU and I'm concerned now, especially when it comes to our rights, with current politics and the religious community and the Conservative majority or minority - I don't know who they are.

Capote wrote every day. He said that's the only way, you have to sit down every day and do it.

I have a lot of regrets, but I'm not going to think of them as regrets.

But, you know, the issues of humanity and what is fair treatment and good treatment of a fellow human being should not really be based on a personal sense of right and wrong or judgment.

I feel like I have to have a voice.

I always work on New Year's Eve, no matter what.

I really, really like writing songs.

Music is wonderful. Especially if there's some kind of content to it.

Music has its own emotional embodiment. It carries an emotion with it. When you associate a lyric with the music, it's much easier; but when you're standing there completely dry in front of the camera with no musical background, just a fine-tuned, get-this-emotional-story across, it's a very, very intense kind of focus.

I do know the effect that music still has on me - I'm completely vulnerable to it. I'm seduced by it.

The only person I really believe in is me.

That was the impetus for me to do music or art, because I knew if I didn't try when I was young, then I would get to be in my 40's and I'd be really unhappy that I hadn't.

We probably, as primitive people, made music before we actually had a language, and that's where language comes from.

I've had some lovely extraordinary experiences on New Year's Eve.

Something's that written out is okay, but it's not always a clear indication of what a person means.

But computers have changed the world for everyone, so there will be some way of working it out.

I could be a housewife... I guess I've vacuumed a couple of times.

New York has always been a city of change and a city about change, and it is a back-leading development. Nobody's going to want to come to New York if it looks like another strip mall.