Gavin Esler Quotes

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Gavin Esler

Profession : Journalist

Birth : February 27, 1953

There's no doubt that prog rock has an image problem: many musicians hate the label, and too many people associate it with 10-minute drum solos and the weirder bits of JRR Tolkien.

Gavin Esler

If we have to put music into baskets, then the progressive rock bands I fell in love with as a teenager made sounds that shaded into jazz, folk, metal, and in the case of the wonderful (and sadly missed) Jon Lord, modern classical music.

Gavin Esler

For me, prog rock has always been essentially British. It combines all our great and eccentric genius. We are not hung up on categories, rules and classification. We love people who break the mould, challenge us and make us think differently.

Gavin Esler

I remember politicians in Northern Ireland were sometimes called 'verbal incendiarists,' as they didn't actually do anything but they said certain things. So when you hear certain politicians using nasty language, that colours our lives. It makes some other people think it's OK to racially abuse people.

Gavin Esler

I've never been a fan of party politics.

Gavin Esler

Maybe because I've worked in the BBC for so long I am completely allergic to meetings.

Gavin Esler

A magazine once asked my favourite beauty product and I said water.

Gavin Esler

I have my mother's nose and my father's bone structure, which I've passed on to my children. My eldest daughter and my mother, when she was young, could be sisters.

Gavin Esler

I can be incredibly stubborn and I'm not sure how that reflects in my looks. The family name is German and translates as donkey! If I think I'm right, I hope I don't seem grumpy.

Gavin Esler

When I do look at myself, I see someone who is fundamentally optimistic. Quite a lot of what I do in my television work involves the less than pleasant aspects of human nature, yet I'm never pessimistic.

Gavin Esler

From the moment he took the oath of office in 1993 until he left the White House in 2001, Bill Clinton was a paradox in power. He presided over the United States prosperous and at peace - but never at peace with itself.

Gavin Esler

I want to stop Brexit.

Gavin Esler

Nigel Farage has got some strengths. He really connects with people. He is a very good talker. I find him very affable. I would very happily buy him a beer. And I am sure he would be happy with it to.

Gavin Esler

Brexit is not only not just about left and right. Brexit is about expertise.

Gavin Esler

I am the typical British aspiring working class. To be called 'elite' by people who have inherited wealth and run hedge funds or worked in the City of London, I don't criticise them for it, but the idea is frankly laughable. Just ridiculous.

Gavin Esler

I feel very fragile cycling in London, whereas in Berlin there are proper cycle paths everywhere.

Gavin Esler

The thing I love most about going to the Rocky Mountain National Park is that mobile phones don't work, and there's no electricity and no TV.

Gavin Esler

My alphabet book at Duddingston Primary, Edinburgh, began traditionally with 'a is for apple,' but when it came to 'g,' it was 'g is for gas globe.' This was in the late Fifties; there hadn't been gas globes for decades. The textbook must have been 30 or 40 years old!

Gavin Esler

At seven years old, I won a scholarship to George Heriot's School, an independent school in Edinburgh, and I was there until I was 17.

Gavin Esler

I did modern English and American literature at Kent University, with no Chaucer and no Middle English: a perfect course.

Gavin Esler