"Forrest Gump. What I appreciated about that — I believe it ended up winning the best picture and an Academy Award for Tom Hanks, both of which were well deserved — but I just loved the interplay of putting him back into actual historical footage of meeting the presidents, and at the time it was so much fun to see that play out on screen. It captured entire eras and major issues, everything from racism in the south to the horror of the Vietnam War — the protests of the Vietnam War — to AIDS toward the end. And, of course, the theme, which is right up my alley, which is, “Hey, it’s about a guy who loves a girl forever.” [laughs] That’s a little bit like The Notebook in this regard. And yet, it was done in a way that I never would have considered doing. I believe it was Robert Zemeckis who directed that. It’s phenomenal."

"The Girl Can't Help It isn't about the status of teenagers, but it had huge impact on teenage audiences. On one level it's like one of those terrible Don't Knock The Rock films - just a compendium of performances. But it's got a more sophisticated plot that alludes to mob involvement in the music business. And it's got Tom Ewell, who's a very fine comic actor, and Jayne Mansfield, who's a fascinating and fated character as well. You get Eddie Cochran and Little Richard – neither of whom played in the UK for another few years – so you can imagine what it meant to The Beatles when they went to see it. All that early rock & roll period is so un-self conscious, people didn't know what they were doing and The Girl Can't Help It showed British teenagers the American lifestyle. America is the thing that everyone aspired to at that point. Glorious Technicolor in every way."

"My sister was into that kind of music. She could afford records, I didn't have a job or anything, I was a kid. That was one of the first albums I really heard, it wasn't until later on that I began to really appreciate what an amazing record it is, sound-wise. I think it's the best album ever made. It has changed for me over the years. I bought a really good stereo system, and suddenly I'm hearing this record like it's meant to be heard. It blew me away. I know it's not got pop songs or anything, but it's just perfection, all the tracks are really exciting. I think it's really out there somewhere. My best friend, every Saturday we'd go to the record shop and buy a single each. Then we'd go back to his house and argue all afternoon about who had the best taste. I was never afraid or ashamed of the things that I liked."