Beth Ditto quotes:

Here is my prescription to heal all wounds. Watch the film 'Funny Girl' at least five times, eat at least 45 chocolate bars, and hang out with all those friends you blew off to hang out with your ex. I truly believe that, through a combination of Nutella, old pals and Barbra Streisand, we can achieve happiness and, very probably, world peace.

Some makeup companies have really good recycling policies, and it's worth finding out whether your favourites are among them. With MAC, for instance, you can take any of your old makeup containers into its shops, and the sweetest deal is that, once you've racked up six containers, you get a free lipstick or lip gloss.

I love sad songs. They say so much. I love country music but even the happy songs sound really sad.

Portland is a place where you can find a community as a feminist, a vegan or a fat activist. Artists, musicians, knitters, and filmmakers can all meet like-minded souls. It's proved the perfect place for me and all my punk friends.

For my group of friends is Lady Gaga eye-opening? No. She's a less dangerous version of what was so cool about pop culture in the '80s. Back then it was so gay and so punk in so many ways.

I was brought up by a single mom in a poor town in Arkansas and while some aspects of small-town life were really positive - like the fact that everyone there is really sweet and hospitable - there is also this close-minded mentality, and that naturally made me want to rebel.

I thought to be feminine was to give in to straight culture, or the beauty standard, but in my heart I had a flair for fashion and style. They were passions I kept secret because I didn't understand I could love clothes and hair and makeup and still like girls.

For me the greatest revenge of all is having a happy adulthood, waking up in my gorgeous turquoise bedroom in the morning beside a person who really inspires me. That's the best revenge a girl-loving girl from the Bible belt could possibly have. And, importantly, it's healthy.

Because I didn't have any queer, lesbian, female role models I hated my own femininity and had to look deep within myself to create an identity that worked for me. Pop culture just doesn't hand us enough variety to choose from.

When you see a fantastic colour or cut in a magazine, perched up on some famous so-and-so's head, it's tempting to ask your stylist for the same, but do not be fooled. The hair in those fancy photos can be very high maintenance.

Thanks to capitalism, the importance placed on beauty has never been so manipulated. We are the guinea pigs force-fed ads that tell us how pathetic we are: that we will never be loved, happy or valuable unless we have the body, the face, the hair, even the personality that will apparently be ours, if only we buy their products.

My dad liked to boil a squirrel head and suck the brains out the nose. Smaller than a chicken, bigger than a rat.

A beautiful plant is like having a friend around the house.

I have been 130 lbs. as well as 215 lbs. I have had blond, strawberry blond, green, pink and purple hair, and none of that has ever exempted me from having lewd comments flung at me in the street.

As a kid, I was always mad - just noticing the women at Thanksgiving, running around the kitchen, while the men were watching football. For one, I don't want to cook, and for two, I hate football. I was stuck in the middle.

I have no control over what people think of me but I have 100% control of what I think of myself, and that is so important. And not just about your body, but so many ways of confidence. You're constantly learning how to be confident, aren't you?

If you have a therapist who agrees with your every word, then your brain isn't getting proper exercise.

I was given baby doll toys myself, and they proved a stark reminder that my life was expected to revolve around childbearing - just as my mom's had before me, and her mom's had before her.

I was born to be married. I just feel comfortable there. I love the idea of being partnered for ever. I love my girlfriend, we've been best friends since I was 18. There's not a thing we haven't been through except for marriage... We've had talks about what we would name our kids since we were in our 20s.

I work really well under pressure but I really hate doing things on a timeframe.

All this fashion stuff - who's cool now - is just a bigger version of the cool kids versus the nerds.

I have a lot of feminist idols. My favorite thing about growing up in Arkansas - well, not favorite but something I've always felt grateful for - was that I really had to dig for what I could. There was no Internet. There wasn't tons of feminist literature floating around.

Girls are taught to sing high and pretty, like Antony, not low and from the guts like Nina Simone. But we're slowly trying to change that. There are so many things we're not told growing up, and it's our true feminist responsibility to take the truth to the people who need to hear it.

I don't have a good attention span and can't spend long in record stores or video shops or games emporiums without getting grumpy.

A few years back, when my style was 'punk grandma,' I picked up an amazing pair of sandals - orthopaedic ones, with really thick soles. I've given them away to a friend now, because these days my look is more '1980s substitute teacher gone wild.'

Get a Job' is about all the rich kids we knew when we were younger, kids who never had jobs but always had money for partying or getting their hair done.

I think that for the five-year-old watching MTV right now, Lady Gaga is going to be an iconic person. In 20 years, the people who are here and talking to journalists will be like, 'Oh Lady Gaga changed my life, Nicki Minaj changed my life.' They'll be saying who influenced them and it will be Lady Gaga, Nicki Minaj, artists like that.

I certainly know first hand the waste one lady can create through her primping routine, because I am a victim of fashion: to me a day without makeup and a bouffant to match is a day wasted. I love it all - whether it's fancy, cheap or, I'm ashamed to say, even if it's bad for the environment.

I really worshipped Mama Cass a lot. Mama Cass, who was really fat and she didn't lose weight. Yeah, she went on diets but for the most part of her life and the better part of her career she was a big person.

My size has helped make me an amazing performer too. The cliche of the Funny Fat Friend: I absolutely was that character - I am that character... It's a complicated bag of tools I acquired, and I've put them all to work onstage.

In moments when I question if I should be having kids, I think of all those phone calls from my sister-in-law, in which, 3,000 miles away, I hear my nephews screaming for her attention. I tell her I have to go because I am packing to leave for Europe, and her tone flatlines: 'That must be nice.'

You know how people love to glamorize poverty? There's nothing glamorous about it. But it did make me really creative. Those days, I was literally taking t-shirts in the day and sewing them back together to make dresses for the night.

There is something to be said for people who have to work hard, be creative, produce what they have with little - or no - means. Those of us from poor homes have the advantage of thinking for ourselves and of knowing that when times get hard, things could always be worse.

I worshipped Ethel Merman and I worshipped Ethel Merman a lot. It's incredible - Ethel Merman was a conventional singer. Her naming her child Ethel Merman, Jr., was, to me, one of the coolest feminist things.

Aretha Franklin was a teenage mom, a musician who came from an incredibly Christian background, but there was a lot of love, which is really inspiring in a feminist way.

I've had a ton of fast-food jobs - it changes your approach to human interaction forever.

Do I ever think Gossip will be really massive in America? No, I don't think it'll happen - and that's fine. It's kind of nice because I get to experience everything at once. I get to come home and it not be weird, like in Paris or something. It is nice to be completely anonymous.

Olympia was a town crawling with music. I was new to the whole punk scene. The culture shock continued; Olympia had bagels! We didn't have bagels in Arkansas. You could order vegetarian food all over town! It was so crazy to me - a place with so many vegetarians, the restaurants made special dishes for them?

Reclaiming the word 'fat' was the most empowering step in my progress. I stopped using it for insult or degradation and instead replaced it with truth, because the truth is that I am fat, and that's ok. So now when someone calls me fat, I agree, whereas before I would get embarrassed and emotional.

I feel sorry... for people who've had skinny privilege and then have it taken away from them. I have had a lifetime to adjust to seeing how people treat women who aren't their idea of beautiful and therefore aren't their idea of useful, and I had to find ways to become useful to myself.

I shave my body in all kinds of ways, wear tons of eyeliner and dye my hair pink.

Starting out really punk came from not knowing any better and listening to music like that, not knowing how to play music - well, still not knowing how to play music.

Growing up as a chubby kid with a ton of imaginary friends and a Cyndi Lauper obsession, I learned about rejection early on and was constantly trying to avoid it.

I'm naturally a mousy blonde, so I dye my hair, and my eyebrows would disappear if I didn't get through at least a pencil a month.

I've had people ask me in interviews what it's like to have money, but that's not how it is. I have a middle-class life. I have a room in London but not a house, nor a BMW.

My number-one theory in life is that style is proportional to your lack of resources - the less you have, the more stylish you're likely to be.

I knew that if I wanted to stop being a pushover I had to get comfortable with small rejections myself. That took some work, but because of it I can now say 'no' to other people with a clear conscience.

Girls are taught to sing high and pretty, like Antony, not low and from the guts like Nina Simone. But we're slowly trying to change that. There are so many things we're not told growing up, and it's our true feminist responsibility to take the truth to the people who need to hear it."

For years now I have run a kitchen-sink punk salon in my house, called Salon du Gay. In the early days, people would pay for a riot grrrl bob or a passable bleach job with a mixtape, $3 or a selection of baked goods - whichever they could afford. More recently though, with Gossip doing well, I've performed these punk hair transformations for free.

I'm shameless, and I love a pun. There's a lot of Beth puns.

When I was a teenager I would lock myself in the bathroom for hours, bouffanting my hair like Patty Duke and trying to recreate Barbra Streisand's flawless eyeliner, only to comb it all out and wash it all off before stepping out into the world a butchish bisexual teen.

I've belched a lot more since I had gall bladder surgery. I don't know why.

Just like my straight friends, I am repeatedly asked when I plan to have kids, and have been told many times, by various branches of my bloodline, that 'even lesbians can have babies these days.'

Granny Ditto always referred to perfume as 'smell good' and for me it's an essential. I have a sweetheart who's extremely allergic to most scents, so I have to be extra careful - as well as creative - in the smell department. The key, I've found, are essential oils, which come in all kinds of 100% natural scents.

Even if you're only wearing trainers and a vest, eyeliner will instantly transform you. People always look put-together when their make-up's on and their eyes are popping - just ask Amy Winehouse!

I want to make the IKEA of clothes for fat girls and boys. Cheap, affordable, basic - but ethically made. Basics, you know? Like Spanx - I'm still confused as to why retailers haven't ripped them off yet and done it well. It's because they don't understand the basics behind it. I love Spanx. I'm wearing 'em right now!

As with most phobias, the fear of flying does make some sense, but if ever there was a fear worth quashing then this is it. After all, life is short, and there's a great big world to explore out there.

It's funny how something so normal and mundane that you see every day-your body-can be controversial. The shock value is intense. It's like carrying an art piece around with you all the time.

I said to my teacher, 'I can't be a singer because I'm not pretty enough, and I'm fat.' And she looked at me and said, 'Tell that to Nell Carter, babe.' That changed my life forever!

When I was a kid, Ellen DeGeneres and Rosie O'Donnell were mere blips on the gaydar; and they were both still in the closet.

It's really hard for me to sometimes put myself out there, like 'Hey, how do you feel about making music together?' because maybe I'm afraid of rejection or I don't want to put anybody out. It's the Southerner in me, like, 'I don't mean to bother you but do you mind making a song?'

When I moved out of my mom's house at 18 I was almost as sad to leave her sewing machine behind as anything else.

Under the whole "personal is political" motto of feminism, I feel that personal kindness, treating people decently, is political-is punk.

Products are a must - full stop. I'm sorry to say it, but that bob won't look so sleek on its own - you need a little help. It doesn't have to be the high-end stuff that they sell in the salon. Products you find in the supermarket are just as good, and sometimes better.

There is no shame like poor shame. It can make you warm and charming, bitter and resentful, all at once.

Even talking, I'm super-loud. I could never have that kind of meek, little wispy whimsical lavender and lace voice. It comes from my body. There's no way I can fight it.

There is no rule in the pink-triangle guide to coming out that you must wear a rainbow flag cap and organise a full band parade.

ABBA was a direct influence on me.

This archaic idea - that a woman who is unmarried and childless at 30 is somehow unnatural - will probably always exist, and, like most social standards, it is ridiculous.

I don't feel famous and I didn't want my autobiography to be like a Paris Hilton story.

I'm a great believer in karma, and the vengeance that it serves up to those who are deliberately mean is generally enough for me.

I was born fat and have always been, which was just fine and even healthy and cute until I turned ten or so. Puberty hit like a hurricane and brought a new set of rules. All of a sudden it was my fault I was chubby.

I've never had a very quiet voice. I tried in choir to make it smaller, and it just didn't work out. And I listened to a lot of soul music when I was growing up on my own accord. But I was mostly into Mama Cass and Gladys Knight, and they all had big voices too; just different than mine.

My mother told me Homer Ditto was not my father. Nope. Mom had had a fling with some other guy who was my dad. Some dude who didn't stick around too long who Mom was happy to get rid of. She chose Homer, and Homer chose me, so he lent me his name even though I didn't have his blood.

With a stretch belt, anything can be a dress - a dinner napkin, a tablecloth, even a towel. Just wrap and snap, and away you go in an incredible outfit. Another plus is that the belt will pull all eyes to your lovely curves, and they even look good around a coat or a jacket.

High school wasn't so bad though because, by then, I had worked out that there were far more nerdy kids and poor kids than there were rich, popular kids, so, at the very least, we had them outnumbered.

We all seek approval, and our mother's seal is usually the most important. The nitty gritty is that we have to accept ourselves, even if it is just to be ready for the next cut-down. Mom's blessing or not.

You live in this shadow that you're going to burn in Hell until you're saved. And I still worry about it a little. I don't believe in Heaven, but I do still fear Hell.

I mean, if I was living to please people, I'd have never been in a band at all. I wouldn't have anything awesome around. I'd just be bored.

I always was really confident about myself, about my voice, myself as a person, my body, all of those things, but as a songwriter - I just didn't identify as a songwriter at all.

The fit is my main focus, I want the fit to be great and that's the focal point for me.

I'm passionate about color. My best friend and I sit and look at Pantone books for fun.

The black bubble dress is a must! The leggings are absolutely amazing too, they fit perfectly and let you breath when still being super high-waisted. They are everything and so easy to pair anything with.

The shape is the most important to me because it is what really matters and what's really missing in the market. Anything else is easier.

You know, either I'm too fat or I'm flavour of the month. I don't feel either, but maybe I'm both, who knows?

Why wear pants when you can wear a muumuu?

I love to make people feel like they are taking a part in their own body and evolution.

I find inspiration everywhere. I love challenges and my favorite thing is to find something ridiculous and be like "if it's all that I have available to me, I am gonna make it look the best that I can".

I'm constantly thinking about what I'll do next. I never count on music being a career of longevity. I mean, longevity is key, and I hope that it lasts, but you just don't know, because it's not in your hands, you don't make the decision.

'Get a Job' is about all the rich kids we knew when we were younger, kids who never had jobs but always had money for partying or getting their hair done.

To be thin and to stay really thin, sometimes some people literally do coke all the time. Some people smoke cigarettes instead of eating. That's crazy. But that's 'okay' because you look healthier.

I'm on a diet. It's very strict: all hot dogs. Just sausages, constantly. It's working out - I've gained fifteen pounds!

I love Vivienne Westwood. Her work is so interesting, you can always find something that's great and fits you.

I'm not sure that I am able to feel embarrassment.

I am tired of spending a little bit of money in a lot of pieces because they keep on falling apart.

I was overcome by the Holy Ghost one time, but in a Baptist way. I was six or seven, and I was saved. I just cried and cried. It was joy!

When I think about the idea of Rebel Wilson having to go to the Oscars and not having something amazing to wear that's made for her, it drives me mad.

I believe I owe all the best parts of my adulthood to embracing my imperfections and showcasing them.

I hate to do what I'm told, that's why I'm not good at 9-to-5s.

Someone told me once that Lucinda Williams takes six years between albums, and that's what stuck to me; it's like, you really are a factory. You don't do things to make them, on your own time.

I'm 90% performer, 10% musician. I've always said that Gossip are a band I would go see, not a band I would listen to.

When you get a certain amount of media attention, I think people are like, "Where's your other album?"

I love Adele so much and it's honestly not because we're both big.

You don't pigeonhole yourself, people pigeonhole you. If the world is not at a place yet where it can just be like, "This music is gay and it's music," then it's not my fault that it gets pigeonholed, it's not the people in the band's fault, it's because people won't just let music be music, people who need to put a name on something or to critique something.

I think if the world were a fair and just place, there wouldn't even need to be a gay label.

My life hasn't been conventional and it hasn't been linear. I've had to make it up as I've gone along, which has taught me a lot. If you don't accept the obvious options that are laid out for you, it's up to you to work out where you're going and to create your own specific rules and goals.

I don't love the word luxury because it feels Bougy to me.

I can take care of a house, and some people I meet, I think, 'You don't even know how to make a bed.

I think from a major-label perspective, if you were on the flip side of things and that's the world you were used to working in, your interpretation could be, "Oh, they're having trouble writing songs," when really it's like, "No, I'm not ready to write songs, I don't want to write a song right now, if I did write a song, it would be forced."

I was always being told off at school. The teachers would say: 'Everyone's talking, but you're the one I can hear.

I have no control over what people think of me but I have 100% control of what I think of myself.

The thing about being on the majors, from the beginning, going into this, I was like, "I'm not going to be treated like a factory," because that's never the way it was done before. You're talking about a major label, we're talking about serious business; you're not an artist anymore, you're a business, you have to work in terms of product, you have to release a product, and I don't really think that way at all.

A weird thing about Gossip that I've always said: "If I weren't in this band, I would never listen to it." But I would go see it. It's a band you would go see that you don't necessarily listen to.

I have learned so much making first collection that I am excited to use all of it towards making the next one even better! It's been an amazing learning curve and experience.

The plus-size revolution that has been happening lately is incredible but it's also creating this "other" beauty standard in which you have to be an hourglass, you have to be super sexy and fierce about showing off your curves. That's quite frightening to me, and I don't fit in it, I don't want to fit it.

Not everyone wants to be sexy everyday, wearing tight dresses and spanx...

I'm a feminist, of course, and I feel as if I'm very politically correct, although I do question what's P.C. and what's not - I don't just accept what I'm told.

We have to stop this idea that we have to be a certain shape.

I never said I wanted to be a singer for the rest of my life.

I think it's really cool that there are people like Adele on the cover of 'Vogue' and 'Rolling Stone,' and like I think it's really important that people are talking about your body, because if they don't, then you'll never be able to break that barrier.