- Over the years I've had my fair share of fashion disasters. Up to the age of 11, I mostly wore chunky, multicoloured jumpers embroidered with pictures of dogs. I also made the mistake once of getting my hair cut very short. I looked so bizarre that my father actually broke down in tears when he saw me.
- My short-term memory is almost non-existent. I could tell you what colour hat I was wearing on my sixth birthday, but I'll have no memory of where I'm supposed to be in five minutes or who I'm meant to be calling. I need to write everything down and keep referring to my notes.
- At 14 I had a near-death experience. My older sister was driving me along a dual carriageway from Liverpool to Chester. This elderly Canadian tourist fell asleep at the wheel and veered across the road, crashing straight into us. My seat belt wasn't properly buckled, so when the collision happened I was thrown forward and my back snapped. I could so easily have died. My back was broken and I had to have three inches of damaged intestine removed. For weeks I lay in hospital on a morphine drip, and I spent another five months in a full body brace. Needless to say, I always remembered to put my seat belt on after that.
- I'd rather be uncool than cool. It's not that I really try to be uncool, but there are few things more embarrassing than seeing someone who's going out of their way to look cool without realising they've turned into a parody of themselves. If I ever turn into someone like that, I hope my mates will give me a hard kick up the backside.
- I have a talent for karaoke. I used to do it in pubs and always did well at it. My speciality was Roberta Flack's Killing Me Softly With His Song. I don't rate myself that highly as a singer, but I wouldn't rule out the possibility of fronting my own band some day.
- I hate animals. I just can't be bothered with them. Dogs just seem stupid to me; cats are evil. I'm not against hunting and I don't mind admitting I've got loads of furs. The only animals I like are sharks, whales and turtles. I'm very fond of alligators, too. I'd be happy to have one of them as a pet.
- My idea of living hell would involve being stuck in my first ever job for the rest of my days. After leaving school, I worked in a factory where my job was to pick up sweet tins with a big wooden fork and shove them in an oven. There were people there who'd been doing it for 45 years. I lasted for a summer, but it felt like a lifetime.
- Although I had a very strict religious upbringing, I find it hard to have any belief. My father was an evangelical pastor and I went along with his beliefs until I was 11. Then I started to realise that not everything my dad had taught me was true. It doesn't seem strange to me that people believe in God, but I'd prefer it if they kept their beliefs to themselves. I'm not looking to be converted. I'd like to think there's something else in terms of a higher power and that life has some purpose. So I'm keeping my options open.
- [on why she switched to the saxophone after showing early promise on the flute] It was far less poncey.
- Believe it or not, the sax can be sexy. I'm on a mission to get more women to play the saxophone. Ask most people and they wouldn't be able to name a female sax player. Maybe women are put off the instrument because it looks heavy and playing it involves a lot of effort. Perhaps they think it's uncool because it's hard to look sexy when you're blowing into it and your face is distorted. But they shouldn't think that way.
- I'm known as an indie pin-up, but really I'm just one of the lads. Being the only girl in the Zutons, I've learned to be that way. It was weird when I first joined the band. There would be times when I'd be talking and I'd realise that the other band members didn't have a clue what I was going on about. When they took the mick out of me, I'd get upset. I needed to be less girly. Now I've toughened up and I can more than hold my own with the boys.
- If I were a man I'm not sure I'd fancy myself. There's too much about my body I don't like. I've got terrible skin and too many teeth. I've got knobbly fingers and I can't stand my feet and my knees. I'd like a bigger bum and larger boobs. The only thing I like about my body is my stomach. Everything else I'd happily change.
- As a child I was a nightmare. I was always full of cheek and tested everyone's patience to the limit. I'd do things like nick the teacher's packed lunch and eat it in front of him, as if to say, 'What are you going to do about it?' I was always up to mischief, always on a final warning. The only thing that stopped me from getting expelled was that I broke my back and they felt sorry for me. However, compared to our singer Dave, I'm a lightweight when it comes to mischief. He was once expelled from school for cutting off all the hair of a female classmate and covering her head in Sellotape.
- If I had a pound for every time I've been compared to Lisa Simpson, I'd be the richest woman on Earth. Apart from the fact that she plays the sax, I'm nothing like her. She's far brainier than me. If I was a cartoon character I'd like to be Jessica Rabbit, but I haven't got her curves. I'm probably more like Minnie the Minx. Or maybe the Road Runner, because I'm always fizzing with energy, forever in a hurry to get to places.
- I was happiest at 15, when everything exciting was illegal but I did it anyway. It was a great time to be naughty, doing everything for the first time. Not just sex. Everything. Looking back, it was an incredible time. Life's far from dull now, but it's impossible to recapture the thrill of doing all those things for the first time.
- If I could change one thing about myself, I'd like to stop smoking. But all saxophone players seem to have a weakness for cigarettes. All the jazz legends smoked like chimneys. I think the only thing that would make me stop is if I got pregnant, and I can't see that happening. Having babies is not on my agenda right now. I doubt I'll ever be ready for pregnancy. It looks too much like hard work for my liking.
Contribute to this page
Suggest an edit or add missing content