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" When I was 14, I heard Otis Redding in a club local to me, and I was blown away. It leaped out at me and went straight to my heart. I set my sights on singing like that. "

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" I look back on the early days of Free with Paul Kossoff with the most fondness of any of my bands, because I met him at a time when I was in London and very hungry, and we believed in each other. "

Paul Rodgers

Hungry

Back

Free

" With Free, we were teenagers, and, ummm, there was a lot of raging hormones. "

" I had a band when I was 14, and we would play around in my hometown of Middlesbrough, and we'd go to the club afterwards, which was the Purple Onion then. There would be live bands playing, and in between that, the DJ would be playing records. "

Paul Rodgers

Play

Purple

" I was brought up in a fairly emotionally repressed kind of society in Northeast England where one didn't express emotions and was expected to keep a stiff upper lip. "

Paul Rodgers

Emotions

Kind

" I got the idea of meditation from The Beatles. It was a fad, but I've found it beneficial in my crazy life. "

" You go through periods of times where bands are calling the shots, and then sometimes, you've got the record companies calling the shots. I think it has to be a bit of both to make the thing work. "

" I look at John Lee Hooker and Muddy Waters, guys who had a fantastic longevity, and I learned something from them. They didn't try to sell records. They weren't saying, 'Ok, what can I write, what can I do in the studio that will sell?' They were just doing their thing, and people picked up on it. I like the idea of that. "

" Free - I miss that band, but when I look back, we were very young. "

" I got the idea of what a band should be from listening to Booker T and Otis Redding. "

Paul Rodgers

Band

Got

" I like following whatever's right for me at any given time. I could have stayed with Free for 40 years, but it becomes a corporate entity after a while, and once I become locked into it and governed by it and am expected to do a certain thing all of the time, I tend to want to move on. "

" There's a lot of trickery that can go on in the studio, and there's a lot that one can do - none of which I am interested in even slightly. I mean, you can actually tune vocals and stuff like that, but it's so hideous, I can't believe it. "

Paul Rodgers

Believe

" If not for music in my life as a young person, who knows where I would have focused my energy. "

" I was conscious of vocalists from an early age. "

" Free got famous fast, and it was a shock. You're working towards it, and when you suddenly get it with bells on, it is a bit much. I don't know how well I dealt with it. "

" I saw The Jeff Beck Group at the Marquee Club in 1967, when he was with Rod Stewart, and holy smokes, they were amazing. "

" When Free came together, there was a creative magic around us, something unique and different. "

" Artists like Otis Redding, Sam & Dave, Albert King, Ann Peebles, Isaac Hayes, and so many more gave me hope when I was an angst-filled teenager trying to make sense of it all... They were my teachers. Through their music, I learned how to live, how to be true to myself, and how to tell my story as a songwriter the way that I was feeling it. "

" I love it when people come from all over the place in separate vehicles, and they all come to this venue and become one energy. When that happens, it's a very magical thing. I think that helps the world go around, and it's what we do as performers - bring people together. "

" I still love 'All Right Now,' strangely enough. But then that's probably because I didn't play it for some twenty years. "

" I've been influenced by so many great people , like Sam Moore, Wilson Pickett, Otis Redding, John Lee Hooker, B.B. King, so many great blues and soul artists that I completely revere. So it's strange for me, actually, to hear somebody say, 'Oh, I was deeply influenced by your music.' "

Paul Rodgers

Soul

King

" Every day, every time I sing, I feel blessed, really, to be able to do that. It's like having wings, in a way. It's a bit like flying sometimes, because you go off into another realm. And a whole lot of people come with you. It's amazing. "

" I didn't really like the '80s, to be honest with you. There was some good music that came out, but it went a bit disco for me. "

Paul Rodgers

Disco

You

" Ann Wilson has an amazing voice and is a brilliant songwriter. "

" There were personality clashes in Free, really. I think it's as simple as that; I think we felt we weren't leaving each other enough room to develop in our own way, and we were restricting each other. So we said, let's go different ways. "

" I have a lot of analog. I think a lot of people do. There are a lot of people that are re-discovering it. I still have a lot of my old records from back in the day. It's a joy to play things like Junior Wells' 'Hoodoo Man Blues,' and John Mayall & The Blues Breakers with Eric Clapton. There's a warmth that you can still feel. "

" I am proud to be a Canuck. "

Paul Rodgers

I Am

Proud

" There are so many challenges and different parts to the job of singing. When you're in the studio, you have to be really, really, precise. You've got to keep everything clean and nice because that's going to be something that's down forever. And then you go onstage, and it's much more in the moment. "

" I come from a working-class family of seven children. "

" I toured with Lynyrd Skynyrd as a solo artist, many years ago. I love those guys. "

" Only Freddie Mercury could do Freddie Mercury. He was absolutely brilliant - I loved him to pieces, and I had a great deal of respect for him. "