"We played at the Freddie Mercury tribute at Wembley in 1992. The best part was doing 'All The Young Dudes' with Bowie and Mick Ronson and Brian May. That was the best three minutes – musically – of my career, from an emotional point of view. It was the last time Mick Ronson played on stage and it was celebrating the life of a phenomenal musician that we all miss to this day. Brian May is a career long friend of mine. I remember Phil Collen (guitar) was really nervous. I said to him: 'You're bloody doing it. You'll regret it you're entire life if you don't' I literally had to drag him on stage by the collar. We were looking across and there was Ronson and Bowie and May. And it's my glam anthem, you know? It's my funeral tune and there we were doing it with everyone who ever meant anything to me all on one stage. Bolan would have made it even better I suppose, but he was dead. But this record Ziggy Stardust? The way I see it is this: what other record could have influenced, say, me, Boy George and Morrissey in the same way, you know? We don't have much in common but we all saw that same thing…. we saw Bowie with his arm around Ronson on Top Of The Pops and it was like 'well, that's what I'm going to do for the rest of my life'. Seeing it on colour TV as well: it looked amazing. To see Slade; The Sweet; Bolan - all of them with the purples, greens, oranges, reds and silvers – it was bonkers. Even Gary Glitter covered in bloody Bacofoil. To come from black and white to that! Bowie oozed class. I got the Ziggy album when I was 12-years-old. You're full of shit at that age but you're also a sponge. And I was listening to things like 'Rock n Roll Suicide' and I'd think: 'I wonder if we really are all going to be over and done with by 1977'. It was a great story. [sings] 'Pushing through the market square…' Brilliant vocal delivery which was a) listenable b) commercial and c) totally accessible to anybody, from hardcore Bowie fans to little girls who were probably enamoured of David Cassidy. I was listening in awe. He had it all."

"I heard this for the first time at some point in the mid-90s and it had a big impact. For something so old, it sounded more like the future than anything being released then. It was hard to find on LP, but my friend John McKeown had a copy that I would borrow or listen to round at his. Eventually I bought a CD player so I could get it on reissue, as it took me years to find the vinyl. I reckon Eno was frustrated in Roxy Music. There didn't seem to be enough room for his experimentation or ego. You feel that he's running wild with pent up ideas in the way George Harrison did on All Things Must Pass. Although the sound is unconventional and experimental, it doesn't feel over-considered or precious in the way that many contemporary prog LPs do. It's spontaneous and quite thuggish at points. 'Blank Frank' sounds like he's wearing out the strings with a scrubbing brush. It's beautifully constructed as an LP. The songs are distinct and can stand alone, but there are wee passages of sound that link them together and the songs often overlap into each other, moving effortlessly between moods and musical conventions, melody and abstract noise. One moment 'Cindy Tells Me' sounds almost like it could be on the soundtrack of Grease (despite the lyric of rich girls confused by their new freedoms leaving their Hotpoints to rust in their kitchenettes), then you're in the dark, foreboding gloom of 'Driving Me Backwards' - ""kids like me have got to be craaaaaazzzzzyyyyy"" - what he does to his voice at that point will always sends a great shudder through me. I love his vocal delivery. It's very English and of that time - I hear it in Kevin Ayers, Robyn Hitchcock, Bid of The Monochrome Set and Syd Barrett, but none of the English singers around now seem to sing like that. What happened? Did that accent die out? There's a lovely send-up of the other Brian in 'Dead Finks Don't Talk' where he slips into a lecherous deep croon. It's heavily layered throughout, but it sounds like he didn't listen to himself as he double-tracked it. The phrasing and exaggerated vibratos don't often match which adds to the unnerving sense of panic which can suddenly drop to an intimate murmur. Eno has such a huge and recognisable persona, but not as a lyricist. There are some incredible lines on here: ""send for an ambulance or an accident investigator…""; ""Juanita and Juan/ Very clever with maracas…""; ""By this time time I got to looking for a kind of substitute/ I can't tell you quite how, except that it rhymes with dissolute…""; ""Meet my relations/ All of them/ Grinning like facepacks…"" the imagery is vivid, unsettling and direct. That's from a guy who pretty much abandoned writing lyrics shortly afterwards. Like Hunky Dory, this LP bridges two distinct parts of a career. There's still a Roxy flavour (Phil Manzanera is all over it), but songs like 'On Some Faraway Beach' point towards his ambient sound of the later 70s. It's a fleeting moment, never to be repeated. Well, except for on Taking Tiger Mountain. Maybe that's what makes this moment so great. He could have made another fourteen records with this template, all of which I'm sure would have had virtue. But he didn't. When we recorded our first LP, I played it to Tore Johansson [producer] and said I wanted it to sound like this. It didn't turn out that way, but it definitely had an impact on the session. We asked Eno to produce our second LP. He sent us a nice letter saying he couldn't do it, but that his daughter was a big fan of the band... Looking back I realise that it was the Eno who made this LP I was asking to produce. He's a smart guy and probably spotted that straight away."