"As with Bresson, I could have picked almost any Godard flick. I went for this one because it’s the one Criterion carries that I’ve seen most recently. Also, the filmmaker (who credits himself in this movie as “JeanLuc Cinéma Godard”) could do no wrong in this period of fifteen films in eight years, starting with Breathless in 1959 (though I prefer his most recent, late movies). As is often the case in Godard films, characters in this one come to a bad end. The director has a deep, fatalistic, despairing streak. Truffaut, who conceived the original story for Breathless, described how, when at the end of that movie Belmondo is shot, Godard wanted one of the cops who’s responsible to shout to the other “Quick, in the spine!”—but Truffaut persuaded him it was excessive. While, again, what’s really striking about Band of Outsiders is the sheer thrill of life in it. It’s so pretty and overflowing with life it hurts. Even when the director is boring or a buffoon, it’s moving and happy to see. You feel like he wants you to come out and play with him. It’s inspiring, the way a guy could have Godard’s grasp of cinematic “language” and then just say to hell with it and do whatever he feels like: run away to the south, start dancing, turn the sound off. His sensibility in that eight-year period reminds me of Frank O’Hara more than anybody else. Godard is a great poet—and I mean as a writer, of film reviews, etc.—as well as a filmmaker."

"I could have chosen I, II, III, IV, Houses Of The Holy or Physical Graffiti. Not totally sure why I chose this one, but it starts with ‘The Song Remains The Same’ and ends with ‘The Ocean’, so it almost doesn’t matter what’s in the middle! With those bookends, it was always going to be a classic. But of course there are things I like in the middle, or else it would be a shit sandwich. Every time I get on guitar I play ‘Over The Hills And Far Away’. I’m not a fan of ‘The Crunge’. ‘Dancing Days’ is like an early version of ‘Kashmir’ and the album’s got some reggae on there. ‘No Quarter’ is a great thing to wake up in the morning to because it sort of builds and builds and builds and then sort of scares you out of bed. And ‘The Ocean’ is what I always play on the drum kit - I think if anything Led Zeppelin is defining what rock drums are supposed to be. And Jimmy is a god – a golden god! And hands down my favourite guitar player of all time. I could just turn off the sound and watch his fingers I’m that obsessed. He never seems to play the same thing twice when you’re looking at live footage. He’s always raucous and doing battle with his guitar, instead of just commanding it. I like to watch people that don’t have amps that do the work for them."

"I probably first encountered this when Neil Tennant sang [sings]: "I feel like taking all my clothes off / Dancing to The Rite Of Spring / When I wouldn't normally do this kind of thing" and I thought "ah, well if Neil Tennant wants to take all his clothes off and dance to The Rite Of Spring, I ought to as well". He's one of my idols also - I couldn't put any of the albums in, because they're not as good as the hit singles, but I do love the Pet Shop Boys. I do love Stravinsky as well, and The Rite Of Spring, if you were going to sum up the history of humans and music, this might be the thing that you end up showing off as the absolute zenith of achievement. I remember on the Walt Disney film Fantasia, they had a bit of this and they animated it with dinosaurs and volcanos, and although it was a bit silly, I kind of knew what they were driving at: this music sounded like it existed before humans and after humans! It's like the earth itself is kind of grumbling! He wrote it for a ballet about tribal rites, pre-history, people being human sacrifices, but it says even more than that to me - it's almost nightmarish, although it's got so much virility and astonishing, complex rhythms going on and some great, great tunes. And you can never beat the opening - it's actually a bassoon played up really, really high, going [hums melody] - it's like the eeriest thing I've ever heard!"