"I got this in sixth grade. First of all, the artwork, with those two mannequins sitting at a table, was so weird. That by itself puts it into a class of its own, because most of the other records in my collection just had pictures of pop stars. The songwriting was so beautiful and so simple and so strong, but I was also really compelled by Alison Moyet's voice. Still to this day, I generally don't like chick singers – their high squeaky voices irritate me! But Alison Moyet, sort of like Laurie Anderson, had this really beautiful, growly, rough, bluesy, believable voice. When she sang, I just bought every second of it. I believed her. And the tracks are catchy as all get out. 'In My Room' is one of my favourite songs of all time – the band and I are working on a cover of it. I'm tracing back the genealogy of my new record, and it's in those early Yazoo records, along with Soft Cell and The Cars... what they were able to do with a couple of synthesisers and really simple chord changes, great melodies and believable delivery."

"In high school, I worked at The Video Room in Oakland, California. It had the largest selection of laser discs in the Bay Area. One guy owned all of them. I was smugly aware that most people were watching movies entirely wrong, and would tell them so. I’d explain aspect ratios and assure my friends they’ve never even really seen Jaws until they’d seen it at my house on the Pioneer, hooked up to my dad’s concert amplifier and massive stadium speakers, my own rig. I watched more movies during that time than I did in film school. The Manchurian Candidate was one of them, and it was just [on a] different level. I went in thinking it would be a masterfully directed political conspiracy thriller, which it was, but was also completely bananas. I couldn’t believe some of the choices made. That film gave me permission to get a little bit weird in my storytelling. Once you’ve seen an old lady execute a Korean POW while Frank Sinatra looks on in complacency, you know you can go to crazytown and the audience will stay with you. It’s not easy, but it’s possible."