"Trevor Nelson had a show on Radio 1 called Rhythm Nation, and every Thursday night he would play all this music that would literally become my musical education. Again, it helped me understand myself on a new level. I got introduced to the neo-soul era through him; a lot of the Philadelphia artists like Jill Scott, Musiq Soulchild, and D’Angelo. ""I just love D’Angelo. He’s a musical genius. His gentleness was something that really stood out to me, as did Lauryn Hill’s. It was a real subtlety to what he was doing – very considered in where the notes went, and what word was used. At the same time, it was then like a jam! He really nailed this sweet spot in between virtuoso and jamming. ""When I was in Glasgow, my first ever record deal was signed to this guy called Souljawn. He was a massive soul fan, and he said ‘Oh, I found this snippet online of D’Angelo’s new album!’ It was literally a two-minute, really scratchy clip of him singing this song, 'Real Love'. We’d all wondered where he’d gone, ‘cause it had been six years in between albums! We were up there in Glasgow obsessing over this two-minute clip, playing it over and over and over again! Like with 'My Love is Your Love' there was this want and need for music, and real appreciation of when it’s going to come. The willingness to wait for it – it had been six years and we were willing to wait another six ‘cause we just appreciated his genius so much! ""When his most recent album finally came out, the song was there, fully finished. It was so rewarding and satisfying to hear it all finished. To finally hear it now, and still love it… only D’Angelo! He’s incredible. ""I saw him at the Roundhouse recently and he really blew me away. He inspires me to learn more instruments, and to also just relax in music and allow more of an artistic spirit to come through – to not try and control things too much. It was really cool how he went offstage: each musician would slowly walk off and then he was left there, on his Rhodes piano. Playing piano is one thing, but playing a Wurlitzer or a Rhodes is a different, softer approach. He’s really inspired me to look into more of that jazz-soul realm on that instrument."

"What can you say? He's Nick Cave. He belongs in this mysterious closet. I love that he's so impossible to categorise. I remember hearing his music for the first time when I was 15 or 16, and having no idea what to make of him. I almost still don't. He belongs in a genre unto himself. The one thing I love so much about Nick Cave is that he's a master craftsman. He considers himself a writer, and you can really hear it in his songs in a way that's highly unusual. The way he crafts a song is like no other. He makes no bones about the fact that he's putting a certain kind of poetry to a certain kind of music in a way that just isn't really done nowadays. And he's an incredible performer. There are artists and there are songs, but then there are albums as albums, that really stand up as an entire record. Let Love In, for me, works as an entire record from the moment it opens to the moment it closes. But it also was the time. If I loved a band and they had an album that came out in the late 80s, early 90s, it was probably just more influential, because it was hitting me at a time that was so important. I actually got to meet him last year in Australia. I'd covered 'Ship Song' on a record of Australian songs, so I got to get Nick Cave transmission. Now I just need to get Robert Smith transmission and I'll have the holy trinity."