"The way their styles went back and forth was some sick street shit. Their beats were ill and they had like a slur, a slang style going on that resonated with so many people on the street. When I first heard 'You're A Customer' I was hooked; every single record was so tight and so completely banging. I think they had four or five gold records in a straight row which was such an incredible achievement. They were on some ill roll that just continued. They also listened to the dopest shit too and you could tell that from listening to their music. As well as being influenced by so much themselves, they influenced a lot of people too. Bands like us, Public Enemy, Run-D.M.C were just talking about EPMD so much. Back then, you had to make music that sounded real because if you didn't, people just saw straight through that shit. Most motherfuckers didn't make it but then artists like EPMD showed you how."

"When this album came out, I didn't stop listening to it for an entire year. So much music comes out now that to try and hear all of it is hard, there are few constants. But with this, Liquid Swords was just one of those CDs that never, ever, came out of my car. The way it opened was mind-blowing and its style of storytelling was unique: every single line is like a painting, every single line is a fucking picture. It had this constant stream of mad storytelling that was quite unique to the genre. When somebody comes along with something so different and special like that, a moment that hooks you from the start, it blows your mind. It was a time when I thought I'd heard everything and when it came along it was just killer. Moments in music like this are what I look for, what I seek out – these are the moments that make it all so special."

"It’s such a sick song. Just listening to the lyrics, how he can juxtapose sounding happy, but also when you listen it’s quite melancholy what they’re saying you know – “Life, life, tell it like it is, you don’t have to die before you live”. I think I always go back to Sly in particular, across his discography from a production point of view - how his drums sound so crisp, and at the end when you get into the break. I just listen to it and I’m like man, how did you record this? I think the 70s in general… what were they on man? How does the music sound so crisp and completely knock when you put it on a speaker or a soundsystem, how is it still so strong? And then I play Drake and it’s like… it doesn't sound the same. It’s not that I’m living too much in nostalgia or trying to be something I’m not, there’s just something strong."

"Now that we're talking about it, I realise that a lot of these albums are trying to merge those two worlds: the classical or jazz aesthetic with the trashy, rock & roll, electric kind of thing. Obviously PJ Harvey would normally fall on that rock & roll/indie rock side of things but this album is different from all her other albums. It's a real step between those two worlds. It feels really ghostly. It's funny because I was obsessed with this album for a long time, and I didn't listen to it again for ages. Then I started listening to it again earlier this year and I've become obsessed with it again with the same intensity as before. It's just so incredibly evocative of colours and textures and sounds. It's just so delicate but heavy as well. She hasn't been explicit on the meanings of the song from this album but I know that the subject matter is extremely dark."

"Argh, I'm changing my mind now. Do I pick Scott 3 or Scott 4? Err…oh God, this is hard. Sorry. OK, I'll go for 3, purely because my wife and I were listening to it in the kitchen yesterday. Scott 4's my most-played album on all of my devices at home – it's literally been played three times more than any other record. But Scott 3…there's something especially moving about it right now. The end of 'Sons Of', that final moment. We both in tears at the end of it last night. Blubbing like idiots while making supper.

Among Radiohead, Scott Walker's definitely our unifying artist. First of all, it's his voice: it's just undeniable in its power. Then there's the Wally Stott arrangements, all this extraordinary instrumentation. To think that he was doing jingles and TV adverts at the same time. There's such craft in his albums, and such constant inspiration."

"I like a lot of Lou Reed’s records but before I got into him, I heard this record in my college dorm, courtesy of [Pixies guitarist] Joey Santiago. I knew that I liked the record but when I got into listening to it again, some years ago, I realised: I know the record really well. I really like the production and sound of it. It’s very toppy and it’s got some really good sounds. It’s very thin, 70s rock radio production. I’ve never really met Lou. I mean, I’ve been in the room with him on a number of occasions on tour and hanging out in the same breakfast rooms, but they’re situations when you don’t want to bother someone. I don’t remember the Quietus interview where the guy compared me to Lou Reed, but right now if someone wanted to mention me and Lou Reed in the same breath, it’d be a huge compliment. He’s obviously one of my rock & roll heroes."

"I think I first heard it when it was in my parents’ record collection and there was a point where I’d learnt how to put a record on, I must have been about 8. At that point you’re going through the records and judging them by their covers and Innervisions has got this really engaging cover. I got really into Stevie Wonder when I was 16. My taste in music at that age was kind of mirroring my sister’s, but I remember lots of her friends and lots of us were listening to Stevie Wonder like it was a new discovery. We listened to Talking Book, Fulfillingness’ First Finale, Innvervisions and Music Of My Mind which I can’t believe were all made around the same time, this insane output. Now if I don’t know what I want to listen to, I’ll put on Stevie Wonder. It’s a simple, satisfying conclusion to that question."

"That's the early one. That's just a very particular - I had that on CD, I would just listen to it on the plane a lot and really zone out. It's got some really upbeat jams on there, there's a real swing, but then there's a song called 'Naima', which is named after his first wife. It's just the most beautiful, saddest... I don't think it's sad, but it is minor. I would just listen to that record on repeat, it would really put me somewhere. I remember listening to it on the way to Phoenix, before I knew we were going to be laid over, and then on the way back. Just Coltrane in general, he's just the greatest one. In fact, I should say, there's a song called 'Dear Lord' [from Transition], I burned that from a vinyl, and that is number one, the sweetest, most beautiful Coltrane song I've ever heard."

"My mom used to play this and it's funny because recently she told me that she didn't even like it very much. But I liked it a lot. It's not like this is the definitive girl group compilation, it's just that I grew up with it. And it means something to me, I guess, because I've covered two of the songs [Dionne Warwick's 'Don't Make Me Over' and Barbara Lewis' 'Hello Stranger']. I probably didn't realise just how important it was to me back then, but the songs have stuck to me over time and so I've come to understand its importance. All these playful and soulful performances, they're still very inspiring to me even though I was five or six when I was listening to it a lot. There wasn't a lot of music my parents played that I enjoyed at that age, so it's in there pretty deep. It's very 1950s, very glittery, very Phil Spector-y. It was pretty formative."

"This was really important to me as a teenager. I was 15 and my friend put these headphones on me - I think I've talked about this in other interviews. It's embarrassing because I always say the same thing. But anyway he put these headphones on me and he had Live-Evil on his Walkman, and it just blew my mind. It was this culmination of wild instruments. It was just the funkiness, the wildness - it was all so beautiful. There was crazy trumpet on top of funky bass. I had never heard Miles Davis before so it was a crazy thing to hear for the first time. It really inspired my sense of exploration. I was listening to avant-garde classical music - which I never listen to anymore - and I was really interested in dissonance and wildness. So this seemed to be about letting yourself go and not worrying about, or being restricted by, style."