One of the things about grief - I wouldn't generalise, because everybody responds to tragedies in different ways - but I had a huge amount of energy.
David ToopEvery time when it comes to writing a book, I think, "I'm the last person in the world that should be doing this, I don't know anything, I can't do this." And I went through years of that with Into The Maelstrom.
David ToopI think I was like [a game of] skittles, knocked apart by this wooden ball, and there's a strength to that: you're not too self-conscious about what you're doing, so you're not too worried about it.
David ToopIf I'd thought, "I can't really play this instrument," I wouldn't have done it! But I didn't care, you know. I didn't care!
David ToopWe drank quite a lot and Tony Harrington said, "We're thinking of starting a record label at The Wire; how about you do a solo record?" I said, "Well, how am I going to do that?" I thought about it, and I'd been working on a lot of music in the years before, and I was working as a journalist, full time, really, up until that point; in whatever little spare time I had, I was working on music. So I said yes.
David Toop