"Run-D.M.C came out and it was like some serious gangster shit: bomber jackets and Kangols [laughs]. They were just some serious hood shit and they pushed the limits as far as they possibly could at that time. They laid the building blocks for everything that was to come in that era and for everything where we are right now. It felt so special being able to see that for the first time: I was there at the birth of it and I was watching the first round of this shit build up and up. Their live performances also helped Cypress Hill. We got confidence on stage by originally going to local shows in New York City – Run-D.M.C and the like. All the really big shows too – we'd see 'Ministry' and learn from them as well as all the local acts in the city. I saw bands like Ministry and Run-D.M.C on stage very early on in the game and I drew inspiration [and confidence] from a lot of their live shows and these undoubtedly helped our own future live performances. It was very exciting to be a part of this scene at that time and to see Run-D.M.C with such unbelievable raw power at that time."

"This record was so, so important to me. My friend went to see Slipknot play an instore show at a Virgin Megastore and he came back with this tape with The Workhorse Movement on one side and Glassjaw on the other, essentially Roadrunner Records trying to pitch their next big acts. He gave me the tape saying 'This is fucking rubbish, you should just have it,' and I listened to Workhorse movement and thought it was the worst thing I'd ever heard. But then I listened to Glassjaw and it was so raw and pure, it had that same urgency that I thought Nirvana must have had in the day, no frills, no production to hide behind, it was stripped back so there was no cloak, just dagger. I listened to this album until my CD didn't work anymore. I loved the whole story behind Glassjaw too, how Ross Robinson went and saw them play 30 seconds of a song, told them to stop and then they had a fight with him. It's rock & roll perfection. At that stage I'd played in a couple of bands but I was just taking music in. You're open at that age to everything, and this just really poured in."

"I first heard this maybe eight or nine years ago. It was a new record for me in terms of it being something that I hadn't heard in my teens but as soon as I heard it I really liked it. I like the sound of it and the delivery of the vocals. It felt very throwaway and raw and instinctive and in the moment, which is brilliant. And then hearing more the story behind it and, as I understand it, I think it was their dad getting them out of trouble saying: 'Look, I've got a studio with loads of instruments. Just go in there and stay off the streets and out of trouble and see what you can do.' And then they made, with the help of a few people hanging around, this mad record that ended up being one of the most sampled records of all time. I'm not that good about nerding up about records, as you may have gathered, but I hear little snippets and I love that story. I think it's brilliant. And I gravitate to records that are instinctive and not too forced and it feels like a record where these girls are just enjoying themselves and having fun with these beats."

"To live in New York is to live in a place that is both heaven and hell, kept from dissolving into economic and racial chaos only by the maintenance of a minute-by-minute decency, respect, and understanding. Spike Lee spends a good amount of time, early in the film, dousing a Brooklyn neighborhood with gasoline, as we hold our breath to see who will strike a match. Making perhaps one of the twenty-five greatest dramas of the past thirty years, Lee is in Sidney Lumet territory here, by way of Paddy Chayefsky, by way of Huey P. Newton. The acting is, at times, as raw as you see in film. Danny Aiello, in the self-immolating role of the pizza shop owner who strips away decades of spiritual growth in a matter of minutes, gives one of the great performances in contemporary movie history, and both he and Lee, as screenwriter, were nominated for Oscars. Giancarlo Esposito, Ossie Davis, and John Turturro are riveting. Ernest R. Dickerson’s photography is memorable, as is Bill Lee’s music. But it’s Spike Lee, on his way to making films like Malcolm X and Clockers, who knocks you on your ass so hard you have trouble getting up at the closing credits."