"I got this when we were already started, it was when I raided the album closet of Elektra. It's one of the albums where it was, "Yeah, I gotta have this one". Tom Verlaine and Richard Lloyd traded off rhythm and lead, it'd be like their version of 'Dueling Banjos'! They took turns and there's all these different elements to it. That probably seeped in to [his and Black Francis' playing] on 'Monkey Gone To Heaven' through osmosis. We didn't mean it and it was just lucky. We just figure stuff out. Charles [Michael Kittridge Thompson IV, aka Black Francis] just leaves me alone when I'm doing my guitars. He would say "'Pixify' it", it's when the Pixies really become the Pixies. I'm just quoting him! It's kind of true in a little way. Of course it would be, that's the job, that's a lead guitarist's job, and Charles' job is to make Pixies songs and all that stuff. The guitar happens to be front and centre of the mix. They would even say it, "Now it's Joey's turn", and Charles would say: "Ah, now it's the Pixies.""

"Along with Airplane, An American Werewolf in London, and Raising Arizona, this film is one that I can silently mouth along with every single line of. I don’t know if Reiner, Guest, McKean, and Shearer could have ever known back in 1984 quite how far-reaching the influence of this movie would be. As a British director who made his start in TV comedy, I can vouch for the fact that this film is one of the key texts for every single UK comedy writer, actor, and director of my generation. The fact that it was performed by American actors doing killer English accents just makes that all the more impressive and ironic. So I cannot overestimate its position as an unassailable comedy classic. Along with Monty Python’s Life of Brian (also on Criterion) and Mike Leigh’s 1976 TV movie Nuts in May, it really became one of those movies that create strong bonds in creative partnerships. You either liked Spinal Tap or you were not worth talking to; it became that simple. And quite right too. It’s eighty-four minutes of comedy heaven."