"This song is about a minute long. It’s super-fast and it’s aggro from start to finish. Every time I hear it it’s like one of those old super-fast punk jams that are just undeniable – it’s like, get in the pit and start swinging, leap off the stage or whatever floats your boat. Bad Brains are another one of my favourite bands.”"

"The record came out in October and Roc Marciano is like a national treasure, basically [laughs]. The record KAOS that we did together is just fucking ridiculous and I couldn't wait for it to drop. I wanted to include it because when I heard what Roc had done, I felt the same kind of excitement I felt with some of those early records which is rare for me. He's created a whole different style of subcultural, subversive music right now and he's undoubtedly one of my favourite MC's. His work is mad, original and extremely lyrical like GZA. Like every line he writes, you could make a fucking movie out of each one. To work with somebody, I've got to click with them and I've got to meet them and if it's cool, we do some music together. It has to be like that for me. I've worked with everybody I ever wanted to work with growing up and now, I really like picking artists and working with artists that aren't really well known but who do something extraordinary. This project was all just about getting up, creating art and having fun and just enjoying myself. I've been producing people's music my whole life and I've turned down working with a lot of big pop stars for a lot of money because I just like doing my own thing and it has to be right. I don't like making a beat for someone and just giving it away – it has to be something I love and something I enjoy, which is what this project was all about."

"Their songs have these great back-and-forth male-female vocals and really introspective lyrics that I love. We toured with them in the UK with Bikini Kill so I met them and was like, "Jesus Christ, bands here are just so much better than in the US" and, "Oh my god, they're so fucking good!" They made me feel like they were a band that was happening in the now. They reminded me that even when you're not in your twenties or whatever, it still has to be about now and not about yesterday. You can write a song about yesterday but the reason you're doing it is so that you can get to now. Your work has to be about now and not about yesterday: "This is something I'm thinking about today." All the beautiful, humble moments on their album, the musicality of it is just amazing. I've seen them live like a thousand times and they've never disappointed me – Rachel [Evans] and Ben [Phillipson] singing together is just an absolute dream."

"This is going to sound ridiculous because it’s going to sound like I’m doing a bunch of ass-licking but Pulp Fiction. And I shouldn’t hesitate, because it’s good cinema, but… I remember watching Pulp Fiction — whatever age I was, teenage years somewhere — and really struck at the cleverness of it and loving that you can have something as violent, but as humorous and as… I could feel — you know, because I didn’t know him as a person at that point; he was just the director — but I could feel his brain working in the conversations in his head, and his opinions about stuff. The conversations that were like, “I’ve had conversations like that about why you call it a quarter pounder or a royale with cheese.” It was so clever and reachable by me. And I wasn’t a film buff, I wasn’t sort of like a fan about any of that stuff. It just really spoke to me, it was so clever. Then I went back and watched Reservoir Dogs. I think I’d seen it before but I went back and watched it again. But yes, Pulp Fiction was definitely… Actually, it’s cool that I get to say that; I’m happy to be able to say that."

"This movie is still my favorite movie of last year, and I think I have to name it because I just thought it was an extraordinary film and I still think about it a lot. I saw it in the theater and it really hit me like a ton of bricks. I think he’s a really extraordinary director, David Michôd. Ben Mendelsohn and Jackie Weaver — every single performance in that I was so impressed with, but in particular just the direction. That’s a director that I appreciate the sense that he allows his actors to just act and have these really quiet moments, and he really just created this world — the atmosphere of that movie was amazing. For a first film, too. The way that he was able to create a level of tension with actors not really saying much or doing much, it was just what he did with the camera. There are not a lot of films where you can just appreciate the camerawork and what a significant aspect of the whole film it is. It was perfectly curated."

"I picked this album up shortly after it came out, and at the time I was in a teenage band, who were awful, and I wanted to scream and I wanted to sing but I didn't know how to do both, and I heard this record and I just kinda gave up on the idea. I remember thinking 'Brody Dalle's doing this better than I ever will, and it's a girl,' and immediately I just loved everything about it. When you're a young teenage boy in the suburbs at some point you've got to get by on testosterone alone just to survive in that field of football games you don't want to play in. I just loved Brody fiercely, unapologetically being herself, and it just sounded like a glass of fucking acid in your face. I really like every record they've made, but Coral Fang specifically is as close to acid in the face as music gets. Every now and then you'll get a band that works purely on chemistry, and then sometimes there's a person in the band that's just magnetic, and for whatever reason you just can't get away from them. I think it's got a lot to do with that open sense of self and the confidence that comes from knowing who you are as an artist. It doesn't really matter if you've got no idea who you are as a person – I've just become a dad and that's turned everything I thought I knew about myself on my head – and she's definitely a role model in that respect, in regards to just unashamedly being herself. She sings and there's a sound, it's like an extra instrument. It's rare you can have someone who can put so much style into every word."

"Peter Sellers. I think it might be the perfect film. I saw it in college. I just was blown away. This is not a unique argument unto myself, but the key thing of that film is it’s so wonderful to sit and allow this story to unfold and wash over you. The effect it had on me then is that this final scene, I was, like, weeping when this last moment happened. It’s not even a conclusion to anything. It’s not “the hero makes it home from war” or “the orphan gets adopted.” It’s not this big conclusion to an arc. Yet it is. It is like this unbelievable moment of beauty and grace, and the fact that the film never nods to that entirely until this final moment, to have such control over your medium to do that sort of thing, is remarkable in itself, I think. To see Sellers — he is so magnificent — to see him in a role like this, instead of Clouseau or The Party or something like that, that’s wonderful. But still a very large character. It’s just wonderful."

"I love it because I feel like I’ve got an insight of what my dad was kind of like. Also, in the movie I did with [director Richard Linklater — Everybody Wants Some!!] too, it was just cool to see this is kind of — like, my dad could’ve been one of these guys easily. It just shows that nothing’s changed. You’re relating to your parents — or any generation really — without having to be in front of them. It’s a really cool time-travelling-of-the-soul type of movie, which I really dig. It really holds up. It’s timeless. It sounds cliché — saying “timeless” — because that’s what I’m going to say about every single one of these movies, but the thing that’s cool about that is that there’s nothing close to what I’ve experienced. I didn’t have the same hair. I didn’t have the same music. I didn’t have the same clothes. I didn’t have the same kind of approach to anything, really, but I feel like I’ve been there still. That’s really cool when a movie can do that. You can see behind the mask and everybody can still relate. It’s really cool, and that movie does that."