I was getting Monkees Monthly and there was a competition to draw a Monkee. I did a caricature of Micky Dolenz and won 10 pounds-a fantastic sum of money for me then. I bought a secondhand tape recorder, which further launched me. They've been very responsible for me getting started.

Andy Partridge

Categorized in : Pounds Competition Tape

You may leave school, but it never leaves you.

Andy Partridge

criminal-mind may school

For a heart without love is a song with no words And a tune to which no one is listening So your heart must give love and you'll find that You shine like rain on the leaves you'll be glistening.

Andy Partridge

rain heart song

People will always be tempted to wipe their feet on anything with 'welcome' written on it.

Andy Partridge

wipe feet people

I'm a big kid. I never lost my childlike appreciation of things. Too many people lock it out and throw their toys away and say, okay, I'm gonna grow up and be grumpy and miserable and not think about the magical side of things anymore -- and I can't seem to stop doing that.

Andy Partridge

growing-up appreciation kids

I've always liked the idea of improvised music. Improvised anything. It's what conversation is.

Andy Partridge

conversation ideas

Now that I can see it's the queen's new clothes Now that I can hear all your poison prose Now that I can talk with my tongue unfroze I'm not so sure of Santa or the buck tooth fairy There are no words for me inside your dictionary

Andy Partridge

teeth clothes queens

My parents, especially my mother, were no influence on me whatsoever.

Andy Partridge

parent mom mother

I suppose my father was more influential in my starting to play the guitar.

Andy Partridge

guitar play father

I actually got really petrified by the thought of people seeing me.

Andy Partridge

seeing people

Success is being nothing but a quote.

Andy Partridge

The early gigs were pretty panicky - and great, sweaty fun. We were brand new to most people, and they were willing to take anything brand new, for the first time in years.

Andy Partridge

fun people years

The man who sailed around his soul From East to West, from pole to pole With ego as his drunken captain Greed, the mutineer, had trapped all reason in the hold

Andy Partridge

greed ego men

Now I lay me down to sleep Knowing that your lenses peep Now I eat my daily bread And into the tape spool I'll be fed

Andy Partridge

lenses knowing sleep

By the early '70s I had gotten reasonable and I started to get in hundreds of groups that rehearsed and never played at all. I mean, the most important thing was to look good and have a great name.

Andy Partridge

important names mean

We do this for the art, not the adulation. I'd rather our music get liked and we get ignored. I don't want to be adored for anything other than the music.

Andy Partridge

ignored want art

I don't like touring and it seemed to be getting on top of me in a big way.

Andy Partridge

touring bigs way

You know, I was such a big Beatles fan, and when I'd buy a new album I'd invariably hate it the first time I heard it 'cause it was a mixture of absolute joy and absolute frustration. I couldn't grasp what they'd done, and I'd hate myself for that.

Andy Partridge

frustration hate joy

Where I've arrived now is the product of mixing the very straight with the very exploratory; there's a fine line between the two, although it tends to be getting straighter and straighter because my songwriting is getting better.

Andy Partridge

mixing get-better two

We did a gig at the Marquee and we were supposed to be paid five pounds but we never got it, and it cost us something like 10 pounds in petrol to get there to do it. So what we did was steal some equipment from The Marquee.

Andy Partridge

gigs cost pounds

It's very schizophrenic because I like a lot of very straight pop, like Small Faces, Stones, Kinks; and on the other hand, I like a lot of avant garde things.

Andy Partridge

avant-garde stones hands