"Island Records put out these samplers that cost the price of a single that basically had whatever was cool: King Crimson, Nick Drake, Blodwyn Pig, Quintessence, the original Nirvana. There’s a point sometimes when an independent label will just have everything, and you follow everything they do because they have the best stuff. That’s how I learned about King Crimson. In the period before I was living in London, I saw King Crimson more than any other band, and they had the biggest effect on me. They were so serious. “21st Century Schizoid Man” is just get it out, put it on the table, and deal with that. The combination of heaviness, technical brilliance, and sheer bonkers arrangements was unbelievable. You don’t know whether to be petrified or burst out laughing."

"This reminds me of that lonely summer in between comprehensive and college, where you see people everywhere with girlfriends, and learning how to drive, and you don’t feel as if you’re going anywhere yourself. “Up in the morning and out to school…” It sounds a bit adolescent, but sometimes the songs that really affect you are the ones that mainline into your soul as a teenager. It gave me some hope. This song made me feel like I could take on the world to a certain degree. We’d written our first song in 1985 and hearing this made me realise: “Wow, you can write a song with quite basic ingredients.” And regardless of any tinpot history that we may have with Mr Bragg, I’ll always be grateful to him for this song."