"Photek is moody, it really got me. The title track 'Modus Operandi' was fucking good, the tension, then the first four tracks are really good. It reminded me of CCTV, it caught the atmosphere of this emerging new world coming out the ashes, this refined capitalism, the greed of Britpop at the end of the 90s when things were becoming more intense. Very claustrophobic. They kind of merge, this album and Red Snapper. I used to like getting absolutely walloped after a gig and putting it on, fucking yeah. I was in a sort of Terry Callier type act at the time. He's fucking brilliant - he died about four years ago. That stuff doesn't make the list because it didn't influence the structure of Sleafords really, the kind of music I wanted for it or the vocal. At that time, I only really listened to jungle or drum and bass at home. I was never into those nights, fuck that, no way, I wasn't interested. By that time bar culture had come along and I liked to sit around doing lots of sniff, you know. Sit around, soaking it all in, looking like a tit, you know."

"I love Interpol. They're my favourite modern band, I suppose. Are they considered contemporary? It was a decade ago but I think of them as a new band. Well, they're not part of the 90s anyway. 'NYC' manages to be simultaneously dirge-like and uplifting, and I don't know how he manages to balance those two things. I love the lyrics in it, 'I tried on seven faces before I knew which one to wear.' For me the art of great songwriting is when you're fascinated by the words but you don't know too much about what it's about. It's about giving but not too much. As a listener you should have to join the dots. It's a perfect record for where it came from too, it's got that feel that's very urban and alienated. I really like listening to it on the underground. The drone of the tube trains and the slightly sort of neurotic sense that you get when you're on the tube is perfect for Interpol. It's funny you should say they're like a New York Suede because when they came out people did make that comparison."

"My first favorite film is The Shining by Stanley Kubrick. I am a huge horror film fan. I love them so much. I’ve always loved them. Ever since I was a kid, I’ve been attracted to scary stuff; I don’t know why. When I was younger I would watch a lot of the cheesier process-of-elimination slasher ’90s films. And then I feel like, as my tastes matured a little bit as I got older, I found The Shining, which is a movie that my dad had always spoken about with this weird fear, because he’d never finished the movie. He’s like, “The one film I’ve never been able to finish in my life is The Shining.” So I grew up like, “What is The Shining?” And then, finally I watched it, and it was just incredible. Well, Stanley Kubrick’s my favorite director, so you’ll probably see a lot of his films in the top five. I just love that movie so much, and it’s my favorite on-screen performance of all time, from Jack Nicholson. I think that he’s absolutely incredible. I’m ready to play a role like that."

"She made three in the series, this, then II and III. This one is about hardcore punk in L.A. in the early ’80s so there’s a lot of Black Flag and that whole scene. Its aesthetic was one of the main influences that Chris Blauvelt and I used for Mid90s – for the way things looked, the way the backstage in the apartment looked, for the 16 mm. It’s a remarkable and encompassing snapshot of a scene that I’m personally drawn to, and the ethics and aesthetics of the film are as fucked up and raw as what it’s depicting. The crazy thing is that Penelope Spheeris started as a punk doc maker and ended up directing broad ’90s comedies - she made Wayne’s World (1992)! She also made Suburbia (1983), which is amazing, and another influence for Blauvelt and I. The main thing I did when I became a known as a an actor and had access to people and filmmakers, was me saying, like, “Hi, I’m the kid from Superbad, can I please have all the Decline movies?” That’s how I abused fame at that time."