Photo by our dearest Sandra Croft
1. Harry Nilsson | Jump Into The Fire
I loved this since I found out about Nilsson when I was 16. It starts with a heartbeat and then just jams on it, it’s like the beginning of life itself, and Harry Nilsson sounds possessed. Being a teenager is all about fire.
2. Pulp | Like A Friend
I spent a year living in Canterbury. It is a miserable place, there’s no cool music or art, it just this one shitty club and a student village. At night I just used to skateboard in the dark and listen to Pulp. When I packed all of my things into my car, I put Like A Friend on so loud and sang the chorus to the whole damn town.
You are the last drink I never should drunk.
You are the body hidden in the trunk.
You are the habit I can't seem to kick.
You are my secrets on the front page every week.
You are the car I never should have bought.
You are the train I never should have caught.
You are the cut that makes me hide my face.
You are the party that makes me feel my age.
3. Junior Boys | High Come Down
I was entirely obsessed with this album when it came out. I love how the cover doesn’t make any celebration or fanfare but what’s contained inside is so special. Those drums, and the synth - even listening to it now, nobody has made anything this cool and private since. Showing people seems rude.
4. R. Dean Taylor | Ghost In My House
My good friend Tom who plays in a duo called Shadow Cabinet turned me on to this when I lived in Liverpool. There was a couple of months in this big house of 12 people that I lived in where even if you couldn’t find anybody around you could still hear this song playing.
5. Donovan | Wear Your Love Like Heaven
Summer of 2004 is just a collage of fires, beaches, eating barbecues and putting messages in bottles and casting them into the sea. And all the time the breakdown in this song played in my head. At the end of the summer I met Donovan and he was weird.
6. R. Stevie Moore | Here Comes Summer Again
This is my favourite song right now. It was recommended to me by Jamie Harley last Friday before we collaborated on a show in London and R. Stevie Moore is all I’ve listened to since. Jamie described him as the grandfather to Ariel Pink and bedroom pop everywhere, and he’s right.
7. Dead Can Dance | Fatal Impact
This is how to open an album. An extended gunshot and a beat that sounds chopped and screwed, goth and even like witch house.
8. Panda Bear | Ponytail
So calming. It’s like a hymn. I put it on when things are sharp and it dulls the edges. Spiritual.
9. The Beach Boys | All I Wanna Do
My favourite love song. So gentle and perfect.
10. The Beatles | Golden Slumbers
The whole tail end of Abbey Road. The way it jerks you around like a rip tide and swallows you up, and just keeps moving. What I love about music is movement and nothing moves like Abbey Road. It’s broken, beaten and so rich and celebratory. It’s like pulling on a pair of 3D glasses and seeing the whole world coming at you. The first time I listened to this was on a motorway and the whole damn road came alive.
