Yusuf / Cat Stevens (Father)

Take your time, think a lot.

Think of everything you've got.

For you will still be here tomorrow, but your dreams may not.

They grew out of a whole project which I was working on, which was a musical.

I'd always wanted to write a musical because I lived in the West End and so therefore I was surrounded by theatres and it shaped the background of the soundtrack to my life.

And so I was working with a man called Nigel Hawthorne, a well-known actor, comedian and a writer.

And we were chosen as a subject for the musical, The Russian Revolution.

Well, the name of the musical was Revolution.

And there was this story going on in the countryside.

This Russian family lived on a farm, you know, out there in the outskirts.

Well, the son's name was Sasha.

And the father's name was Dad, you know, his father.

And the son, in this scene, was wanting to join the revolution.

But the father loves you, you know, he loves you.

That's why he wants you to stay home.

I think as a writer, you know, you take on all sorts of characters and personalities.

But when you're writing for a musical, of course, you have to do that much more seriously.

You must enter the character that you're writing about.

But a lot of my songs were very, very autobiographical, I would say, and so there was always two sides of me.

You know, there was the side which, you know, wanted to get out and do things, and the other side was like, I kind of like things the way they are for now.