If I was a fan of someone as a teenager, then it's OK for me to feel completely in awe when I meet them.

The Beatles were huge for me, ... I used to jump around the room to the red album, the one with all the early hits on it. It made you feel euphoric. It was a sensation I couldn't get from anything else, whether it was playing football, swimming or even seeing 'Star Wars.'

Anyone can play an instrument if you show them how to move their limbs, lips or fingers the right way. It's irrelevant. What is relevant is personality, energy, creativity and disturbing sense of humour.

Cinema, which is influenced by every single part of life, is direct and reaches you immediately. And writing - the best writing is complex ideas communicated concisely. And music - if it's a good tune, make sure people can bloody hear it!

You can't write for the cultural environment - if you do that, by the time it comes out, that cultural environment has passed. You have to be aiming for something that's original - that's the only way you can have any kind of impact.

Traditionally, lots of vagrants and unemployable characters wind up working in kitchens.

Of course, there's a certain type of person who feels that anything which becomes mainstream has to be rejected immediately. And that's part of the indie-alternative snobbery and hierarchy and elitism.