"We liked Free – very bluesy, with a lot of soul. There was a time when there was this thing called Freemania, when they were the biggest thing since sliced bread. They were a bit Led Zeppelinish – brilliant musicians, and Paul Rodgers was a white guy who sounded black. They were all great at what they did. This album didn’t influence me so much, but it influenced the band the other guys were in, Sob. They named the band after this album. They were a very bluesy outfit before Paul Quinn and I joined the band and it became Son of a Bitch, then Saxon – our old band, Coast, was more proggy. So this album became part of my listening cycle."

"When I was drawing up the list, I wanted to start with an album that had come out in the last few years. I had a long list, maybe 50 albums, and there were some recent albums and tracks I’ve liked in the last few months. But, when I’m saying these are my favourite 13 albums that matter the most, I realised there wasn’t anything much from the last 15 to 20 years, which is a little sad to me. There are albums that I love - don’t get me wrong. I nearly included a Daft Punk album, as they changed things a little and I played that a lot when it came out. I thought The Killers’ debut album was a good record."

"I really love hip hop and I thought if I had to pick one album it'd have to be the first Wu-Tang album just for the personalities, and the real rawness and lo-fi urgency about it. I love the audacity of having an interview with the band in the middle of the record. It's something that I think independent music scene should start doing… in the middle of the next Pastels album, like, Stephen and Katrina start talking about how good they are. I need to make it so. I don't think I really got properly into hip hop until the last five years. Something suddenly clicked where it really made sense. These days I like Danny Brown and A$AP Rocky, things like that."