At art school, a teacher said: 'The best paintings are when you get lost in a piece of work and start painting in a stream of consciousness.' I wanted to do music, not art, so started writing lyrics that way. The first song I wrote was called 'Ice Cream and Wafers.' The next was 'Holding Back the Years.'

There is a lot of snobbery towards pop music, to me and pop in general - it's kind of a despised art form.

Music is art, and art is important and rare. Important, rare things are valuable. Valuable things should be paid for.

I am committed to my art. I believe that all art has as its ultimate goal the union between the material and the spiritual, the human and the divine. I believe that to be the reason for the very existence of art. And I feel I was chosen as an instrument to just give music and love and harmony to the world. To children of all ages, and adults and teenagers.... I love people of all races from my heart, with true affection.

It's my opinion that music should not be free, and my prediction is that individual artists and their labels will someday decide what an album's price point is. I hope they don't underestimate themselves or undervalue their art.

The Seed Sounds Weekender is a vital reminder that music doesn't start in boardrooms or big arenas; it starts in back rooms, pubs, basements, and independent spaces run on love, grit, and belief in something bigger.