"One of the bands that I watched in a backyard party that made me decide I wanted to be a musician had played the song '2112'. I heard that weird pedal effect at the beginning and thought, ""Are you kidding me?!"" That was the opening of a whole new world. I lost track of them after Permanent Waves when I started doing my own thing, but you can't ignore their legacy. Alex Lifeson is another with a really bizarre approach to guitar playing. It sometimes seems that his solos don't have a direction because they are like spurts of energy, almost like solar bursts. It's all so progressive to the point that when they do a comparatively straightforward song, it almost seems like they are dumbing things down – something like 'Working Man' for example, which is a simple rock track. But generally they are progressive rock at its very best and bands like Dream Theater owe a lot to them. Although Megadeth has progressive elements, I'm not a huge fan of pure prog as such. I respect the players because they are so talented, but to me it might feel like you're in a straitjacket. Incidentally, people have referred to Rust In Peace as being a progressive record, but in truth it was just where we were at the time. In fact I always saw it as a thrashy little metal record, as opposed to sounding like early Genesis or King Crimson where you dropped acid and went, ""Whoa dude…"" Not that I've ever done that, I should add…"

"I produced this track, so that’s one of the reasons why I put it in here and “The Cutter” was one of those songs that meant a lot to me, because they were my mates. We’d all talked about being in bands and we’d all been in bands together - even though half of them had never had a rehearsal! When Echo & The Bunnymen actually did rehearse, you could instantly see the chemistry from the very start. There was just three of them with a drum machine at first, but right from the start it was very special. I was shocked actually, I remember being shocked at how good it was. I’d never produced a record and I had no ambition to be a producer, so it was a real surprise when they asked me to produce a track. “The Cutter” was the breakthrough track, we’d done “The Back Of Love” which had made it to Top Of The Pops and was in the top twenty, but “The Cutter” took it to another level. When I worked with them it was a bit different because they were my mates, so I almost joined the band really. I played a bit of guitar and put in the middle-eights with Ian. I feel like a lot of myself went into that tune, and when it became a hit for them it was a really big moment. I think it made me feel like I could do something, I didn’t know what, but it made me feel like I could."

"That was a really good band for me growing up. Lots of my friends were into really heavy bands like Korn and Limp Bizkit. And I always used to find a lack of melody and musicality to those bands; they seemed all about aggression and there were no tunes to sing, and the lyrics were usually shit as well. And Deftones were really melodic, and that's rare. They would play in such an aggressive way and yet they had this mode that they always wrote in, so their songs always have a certain sadness to them no matter what they were doing. This record has this incredible sadness and extra power you could never get, no matter how loud you play it. The harmony has such a nostalgic wistfulness. The older you get, the more you get into the feeling and the emotion of it, whereas when you're young it's all about the excitement. The album hit the perfect sweet spot for me, where it gave me all the aggression I wanted from Nirvana, but these guys are extra heavy and they have this amazing sadness. I used to play the drums and would play exactly the sort of things Deftones were doing. I also think Chino Moreno's singing style, high and forceful, along with Thom Yorke, is where my voice comes from. I always try to emulate them. Moreno could sing hard but he could sing a melody that was high and above the dirge below, sailing out above the chaos below it"

"I saw Talking Heads as a kid at Birmingham Barbarella’s. They were about to release Talking Heads: 77. They were quirky and I didn’t know so much about them but they were out of New York, so it was interesting. Anything out of New York I would just buy, whether it was Richard Hell And The Voidoids, Patti Smith, the CBGB scene or Blondie. I loved Blondie and think they are one of the most underrated bands ever – so many great songs, the irony of the lyrics and Debbie’s voice and style. I put Talking Heads in because I think their sense and appetite for experimentation is pretty extraordinary. All of their records have got something on them which was so original. I love the Fear Of Music album but I think the masterpiece is Remain In Light which I suspect Brian Eno had a rather large hand in. Either way, that Byrne-Eno combination worked brilliantly together. The album had the surprise hit single on it – ‘Once In A Lifetime’ – and that again was so unique and had that quirky sense of humour in the video. David Byrne really captured an aspect of America that nobody else did. To me, Talking Heads were the great American band of the eighties. There were lots of other bands that were good – The Cars wrote some great songs – but Talking Heads’ use of percussion, their use of African music and Byrne’s lyrics were so special. For me, he is one of the best lyricists out there."