"""In “Honey Boy,” Alma works deftly, without gimmick. From what I’ve seen, her work is always elegant, but here I think it may also be because of her confidence in the story, how she’s so deeply connected to it and to her subject, Shia, with whom she shares a common bond. LaBeouf’s script seems to want to hide nothing and to do so, it has to be very naturalistically compelling on its own. At first glance the story seems a familiar one, but this script and film effortlessly show the complex nuances of these relationships in a completely new light. Alma and Natasha Braier, her DP, move the camera emotionally, never drawing attention to style, only pulling you into the character. That said, the work is empirically beautiful. As layers are peeled back through their lens and these beautifully raw performances, Alma’s personal connection to the actors and the subject matter navigates the fine line of both sides of the relationship. It would be easier to show us the black and white, but Alma chooses the harder path, taking us through the gray area. Watching the film forces viewers to acknowledge their own complicated relationships; In my case the one I had with my biological father, which I’ve compartmentalized and downplayed my whole life. I had deluded myself into thinking I was content not to know exactly why he wasn’t there until I was in my 30s. I realize now that I still don’t know the answers to all the questions I’ve wanted to ask him. “Honey Boy” is Shia’s very personal childhood memoir but still somehow manages to become universal, interweaving the feelings and roles of child and parent, how those lines are all too often blurred. It’s about the feeling of failure and the feeling of fucking up. Not living up to expectations as the child and never being enough as the parent, how pride can be the most destructive thing to a family. It is emotionally disrupting watching it, not just as the former child but also as a mother who believes she’s doing it all wrong and the ripple effect she may have caused due to her mistakes. Alma’s work nails something which most films nowadays miss the mark at: it evokes a spectrum of very distinct feelings far too difficult to put into words alone. To convey the “unexplainable” in a way that is neither precious nor forced is incredibly difficult to achieve on film, but “Honey Boy” does that in the most compelling and honest way. By making the audience witnesses to the most painfully intimate moments, the film gives them the quiet space necessary to realize it may be possible to understand and feel deeply even for the person whom they had most wanted to despise. “Honey Boy” speaks the truth: that though you always hope there’s a good reason, most of the time the answers you find will never be enough."""

"The Associates were a huge band in Scotland; they certainly had some success in the rest of the world, but they were ours. Certainly when I was growing up I hadn't yet really discovered too many Scottish bands at that point – this was to change of course but these were one of the first I discovered. 
 
 The Associates struck me because I was aware that they were Scottish after I saw them on Top of the Pops and suddenly I made this connection between, 'Oh, you can be from Scotland, where there's no music industry, and be successful. You can get on Top of the Pops, you can be heard by an audience'. It was just a peculiar lesson and a sudden revelation for me of the possibilities that existed for musicians. 

 When you come from a country where back then there was no real established record industry, per se, they stood out. We had a couple of great record labels, you know, 53 & 3rd and Postcard Records and so on, but it was rare to get signed to those two labels, and they were still very small and independent; it was difficult to have the clout of a major London-based record label. 

 The Associates really captured my imagination. I loved them musically and I was really interested in their style. I was obsessed with the 'Gloomy Sunday' cover that Billy Mackenzie did. He had this extraordinary operatic voice; I'd never heard anything like in my life before. 

 I used to go to this club called the Hoochie Coochie Club in Edinburgh, which was big in the game for me, like I spent every weekend at this club. I was introduced to Billy Mackenzie and we really hit it off; I just was kind of obsessed by him. I just thought he was brilliant and really funny, irreverent, rebellious, and fascinating with the voice of an angel. He was so tortured and he had such a sad story in the end. 

 When I heard that he had taken his own life, I was so gutted: the whole of Scotland felt like they had lost a son. He had so much to give – he wasn't just sort of average, he wasn't an averagely successful musician: he was this extraordinary talent, a great interpreter and, again, a great communicator. He was able to make his own brilliant music but to also re-interpret classic songs that had been done by the greats and still he brought something of his own to that. 

 I think 'Gloomy Sunday' by The Associates is by far the greatest version of 'Gloomy Sunday' I've ever heard, and I've heard some amazing versions, like the one by by Sinéad O'Connor or Billie Holiday, but he brings something really special to that.
 
The Associates helped build Scotland's musical confidence to then start really exploring the music scene on its own terms, as opposed to going through London."