"I Love Patrice Rushen! As a producer, writer and keyboard player she is the real thing. And the grooves that she creates are so incredible—I know she was in the studio running shit! ;-) She’s a powerful woman that inspires me to create timeless music! On this record, I listen to 'Where There is Love."

"Gary Oldman must rank as one of or—in my opinion—the most talented actor of his generation. Here, as per normal, he is intoxicating, as Sid Vicious, the “bass player” for the Sex Pistols. England in the ’80s. Drugs. Music. Fashion and baked beans. What’s not to love? Blink and you will miss Shane MacGowan from the Pogues, and Courtney Love."

"If I could have a meal with anyone, it would be Miles Davis. It would be so cool to hear his stories and sit back and talk about jazz. Miles moved to NYC around the same age as I did, and he was a transformative player in the evolution of jazz music as we know it. This autobiography was his chance to tell all."

"He was already with Rod Stewart. I'd started following him because he'd been in The Yardbirds. But he was always the most animated guitar player. His mistakes were tasty. I loved English music - I came here in 1968 and I saw Bakerloo Blues Line, I saw Love Sculpture, I saw Jethro Tull, I saw Spooky Tooth. And The Jeff Beck Group was the template for Led Zeppelin."

"Like Mulatu Astake, this is just music that's in its own universe. I don't really know how to play the piano - I never took lessons or anything - so it's all just based on music that I like, but a few songs on Oh My God are definitely influenced by her way of playing, this really quick hammering on the keys, that's kind of unconventional. “I was on tour and we went to visit our friend Heidi in Amsterdam. She had a record on a small, little portable record player and it was playing Emahoy’s music. It was this beautiful piano music and I felt like I'd never heard anything like it. The scene was really nice: she was hanging clothes up in the backyard. it was a nice day out and it just hit me really hard. I asked her ' What is this?' and then I became obsessed with it."

"Another music pick, this time from James who is the accordion player in The Pogues. I read his memoir, Here Comes Everybody, about half way through writing my own, and it made me go back and change some things as it was just so good. It made me really think about my own writing and how I could improve it. Even if you’re not a huge Pogues fan it’s well worth a read."

"When I listen to jazz, it's usually the piano guys – Bill Evans and Thelonious Monk. I'll put this on in any context: on tour when I'm sleeping, at home when I'm cooking, after a gig. When Joey comes offstage, he wants to play something loud and continue to rock, whereas I need to decompress a little more. So, depending on who gets to the music player first, it's either AC/DC or Bill Evans."

"I’m cautious of musical dynasties. It seems to treat musical ability as some kind of spiritual magic, passed from soul to soul. I don’t get “Only Giles Martin can mix the Beatles because only he has the aura”. Nevertheless, everyone in the Haden family has such a gentle, intelligent, soulful talent that I find it hard to pull out a favourite. Father Charlie Haden is a beautiful, sensitive bass player who has played alongside Ornette Colman, Keith Jarrett and Pat Metheny. He created political, instrumental, jazz with Carla Bley and Don Cherry in the Liberation Music Orchestra. His parents were also singers and performed on the radio as The Haden Family. His son Josh is a bass player and singer with the band Spain and writes the tensest, poised, songs of heartbreak. Petra, Tanya and Rachel are Josh’s sisters and Charlie’s daughters, and although they have been singing for years, it took until 2014 to record their debut album of country songs. Previously Petra and Rachel had been That Dog and Petra had made an acapella version of ‘The Who Sell Out’. They have that synchronicity and intonation that only siblings can have. The three voices move as one. It’s the most straightforward, emotional music. There is no re-inventing of the wheel. It’s just music that lifts the spirits."