Biography

I hate the clouds of po-faced sanctimony that all too quickly gather round musicians. I despise the arbitrary division between music that is allegedly fluff and that which is supposedly substantial. I firmly believe that all music has to be entertainment, because if it isn't entertaining first it's unlikely to be anything else second.

For the same reason that I don't do karaoke I don't want to see Mamma Mia! (2008). This is not because I don't like ABBA. Only goats don't like ABBA. It's because I recognise that what's precious about ABBA is not the songs or the emotions in those songs. What I revere about ABBA is the precise interlocking of sounds that went into making half a dozen shimmering jewels of the recording artists craft. It's because I respect that craft that I know Meryl Streep has no business caterwauling over it.

[on Phil Collins in 2010] His reputation isn't destroyed, no matter how many DJs make lame jokes about him. And he has always sold lots of records, regardless of what fashionable opinion thought. In fact in hip hop he's revered as one of the most influential white musicians of the last thirty years.

Most DJs are a little bit mad. If they aren't when they begin their careers, then a few years sitting alone talking to people they can't see means they generally end up that way.

I don't actually find Episodes (2011) all that funny (as in laughing) and it can be slow getting to its points, but I like what it tells you about the relationships between the British and the Americans in the entertainment business. The Brits like to think success is about cleverness. The Americans think it's about method. That's why their hit TV series last for years, not months.