"This was the mid-’80s, around the time PiL made Album. On that record, I was referring to the heavy metal scene, which had crawled up its own backside. It was endless bands imitating each other, the same nonsense that punk turned into. But great achievements were made in music around then too. Everything from madder folk outfits and pop music itself was becoming very interesting then. I was always pleasantly surprised that oddball stuff would creep in the charts from nowhere. Someone like Gary Numan gave pop music a very distinctive and clear tone that was all his own. “At this stage, I would have been buying everything that was being made, but Alice Cooper’s Killer never left me. That easy way of growling he had was always impressive."

"By 1972, I’ve finished up in art schools, hitchhiked around the country, and I moved to Providence, Rhode Island. In the mid-’70s, I was in a band with Chris Frantz from Talking Heads, and I wrote a couple songs that stuck during that period, including “Psycho Killer.” We also did a lot of cover songs—Al Green, Velvet Underground, the Sonics, the Troggs. The Velvet Underground were a big revelation. I realized, Oh, look at the subject of their songs: There’s a tune and a melody, but the sound is either completely abrasive or really pretty. They swing from one extreme to the other. “White Light/White Heat” is just this noise, and then “Candy Says” is incredibly pretty but really kind of dark. As a young person, you go, What is this about?"