"Raising Arizona. It’s definitely in the top five. I remember seeing that movie as a VHS rental when I was, I think, 12 years old. I’d just had an operation, and I was recovering at home, and my mom just went and got a bunch of movies, and that was one that I could not… I couldn’t even comprehend it the first time I saw it. It was so weird. It was so beautifully weird. At least from my perspective, I had never seen a comedy toned quite like that before, and I just loved it, and I couldn’t get enough of it, and I wound up just watching it over and over again. It wasn’t just funny writing, it was funny looking. The acting is incredible, and the casting, the production design, the cinematography, the score… Carter Burwell, he wrote this haunting score that’s based on an old traditional tune, “Down in the Willow Garden”, which is this kind of haunting river ballad, and it’s the musical motif through the whole thing. It even plays during the diaper robbery scene in the convenience store. There’s like a Muzak version of that playing, and I caught all those little things. I was blown away by the specificity and the choices, and it was one of many movies that I kind of point to as being a moment that, for me, kind of stood out as, “Oh, this is what I want to do with my life.”"

"That’s one of my favorites. That one is on my list, too. When I saw it, it just blew me away completely. I saw it when I was quite young, and I remember thinking, “My god, are these really actors? Could a movie be done this way?” It was something I’d never seen before, and it was so brutal and so real; just like watching a documentary. Those kinds of filmmakers and actors kind of opened up things in me that gave me hope and inspired me. I felt less lonely in a way, because I thought, “Okay, there’s people out there exploring things that I would like to do.” People who were not afraid of darkness; people who were not afraid of going into things that were not charming and easy and, you know, sweet and cute. That one made a very strong impression on me."

"This is one of the first songs I can remember listening to over and over again as a little kid. I had ‘Puff the Magic Dragon’ and ‘Without You’ and they were my two favourite songs. I remember I would sit on the living room floor with my dad’s big headphones on, we had a massive CD player set and I would put it on and I’d just be… [gasps] I’d listen to it on repeat. “That was my first love of a pop ballad and I think those feelings were my first feelings of love in a way. I would just play it over and over and I think that was my first longing for wanting to create, but maybe not knowing that yet. Just being like ‘Oh my god, this is what I love.’ “It’s quite cool that it was Harry Nilsson, because I was just listening to what my parents were listening to at that time. I fucking love Harry Nilsson, he’s one of my favourite artists. Mariah Carey is a diva and she kills it, but it’s a different experience with the Mariah version. I love a diva and I love a good belt and an intense dramatic thing, but I like the more understated, simpler versions of things sometimes too. It’s like the Dolly Parton version of ‘I Will Always Love You’, there’s something so fucking beautiful and understated about that.”"

"This record was the precursor to my operatic downfall when I was 13. Before opera there was Annie Lennox - she inhabited that realm of drama and beauty and the ephemeral. So I was obsessed with that record and I think also, even though at the time I wasn't necessarily aware of my sexuality, it definitely spoke to this self-discovery that was bound to happen, regarding the tenuous nature of gender. That album cover with her looking like a man was just so life-changing – I imagine a bit like when people saw Bowie's record covers. For me, Annie Lennox in that macho pose made so much sense without me knowing what the hell it meant."

"That was one of the 50 albums my mum played all the time when I was a little kid - that is just so deep in my subconscious that I can't even describe what it is I feel when I hear her singing. I remember coming back from college and playing some Laura Branigan for Chris Keating or some friend and them just thinking it was second rate Donna Summer, which it probably is. But I'm like, "Don't you hear the emotion in her voice - it sounds like she's crying!" That was the kind of over the top but still sincere genuine passion I wanted to get on 'Hold You Tight' from the musical. All the reviews of the musical are very critical of this one song, which is probably one of my favourite songs, because it actually sounds like it could be from a musical. It's very Broadway and not very indie rock at all, and I kind of wish we'd been a little less conservative in just going for it. 'Self control' is a timeless theme. Keep it under control in the day and let loose at night."

"I would cheat and say the two Godfather movies, The Godfather part I and II, edited in whatever order; I like the way they were sort of edited together in a single movie, but I also like them as they were released separately. And I think that that, for me, is the pinnacle of movies as a popular art form in America. It’s like a great novel, but it’s a super entertaining movie. It’s always funny to think that that was — you know, if you talk to Francis Ford Coppola, that was sort of his commercial movie that he got hired to make, and that was the one he did to make a lot of money. I have nothing original to say about it, but again, a movie that I cannot imagine ever getting tired of watching. When you come across it on TV, you stop and suddenly two hours have gone by, and you’re still with it. If you think about it, the performances in that… Everyone in that movie, just about, is as good as they ever were."

"The Eagles are fucking bad ass. I've always been a fan of multiple voices in bands and the Eagles are another example of that. Classy musicians who fucking earned their bones through backing up other musicians. I love that documentary that they did ‘The History Of The Eagles’: the drugs, the fights, the stardom, that's just fascinating. I always really admired that band for its uniqueness and the quality of the records they made, the songwriting, the musicianship. This album and that particular track... it's like bigger than they are. Even though that's them. I mean, sometimes musicians, the song and the actual thing that gets recorded at the production, all three of those things line up at the right time and you get that magical thing, bigger than any one of you, even all of you together... it just goes a little step above. It's the whole thing: music is not about perfection, the closest you're gonna get to reaching perfection is the pursuit of trying to get there, I guess. But every once in a while, there's one song or an album that just kind of poke out, that just goes above the ceiling. That title track does that. It's a very magical song."