Sade Adu

London was a really multi-racial city ... It's incredible how comfortable people are with race there.

I don't like looking outrageous.

When you play arenas you can create whatever you want. At a theater the height of the stage and the limitations of the theater can make you feel more separate from the audience.

If you're only making an album every 10 years, it better be good.

I look a lot like my father and his mother.

My musical career was an accident.

I can't see myself just endlessly singing the same songs over and over again.

When I go into the studio, I completely detach. I let my emotions come out.

People generally let me be me. People are aware that I'm not someone particularly begging for attention. They hold back a bit with me.

I'm not over the top; I'm not wacky. I'm fairly understated, and that reflects in the way I sing.

My daughter and stepson are really broad-minded.

My father was a very difficult man.

People are so used to having their lives filmed, they're not even conscious of having cameras around. I still have that sort of suspicion when a camera comes out. I view it as a thing to fear.

There isn't a class structure in Nigeria; there's a tribal structure and prestige as far as money is concerned.

When I was young, people were almost identified solely by the kind of music they liked. People fell into categories of who liked what.

I have no technical training and am completely uneducated in music.

I've never associated myself with other singers, certainly not female singers.

I'm always late.

Radio interviews are really snappy and I'm just bad at that. I just close down.

I just aspire to pick people up. That's my ambition.