Once upon a time in my late teens my Father played me an album by legendary guitarist Wes Montgomery which has this great F Blues on it called ‘Fried Pies’. He also showed me the 5 note Pentatonic scale that would enable me to start playing a basic guitar solo along with the record. It seemed like some kind of giant lightbulb exploded in my head. I have somehow fortunately managed to keep the wolf from the door for the last 25 years playing that very same scale on every song.

The super deep chord progressions and rhythmic displacement that starting coming out of the ‘Intelligent’ Drum & Bass scene in the mid-90’s provided a way in for Jazz musicians. I was in lots of live bands at the time that set out to bring the rhythms and textures of D&B onboard. Songs like ‘Set The Tone’ from the ‘Storm From The East’ compilation on Moving Shadow were the inspiration for me to buy my first Atari computer and start making electronic music.

The West London-based Broken Beat scene of the late 90’s/early 2000’s was at the cutting edge of a new fusion of Soul, Jazz and electronic music. ‘Destination’ was a perfect futuristic amalgam of Roy Ayers/Rare Groove and U.K Beat culture that totally blew my mind. I got deep enough into the Broken beat sound that I was lucky enough to play some shows with Mark de Clive-Lowe, Lady Alma, Bembe Segue and Co, and the sound is all the way through my first Lanu album on Tru Thoughts.​

​​A perfect example of the sound of a raw Funk instrumental on a 7” vinyl record. ‘Hotpant’s Breakdown’ and songs like it were the inspiration for the first couple of releases I pressed up on my own label Bamboo Shack Records. Later The Bamboos would take on a life of it’s own as a band, but back in 2001 I was more excited about pestering Keb Darge at the DJ booth at his night ‘Legendary Deep Funk’ at Madame Jojo’s in London, and handing him a freshly pressed record.

Kevin Parker’s vision of Psychedelic music (and music in general) for the 21st century is still evolving before our ears, but I felt he hit on something on the ‘Lonerism’ album that was revelatory for me. The way the form of this song evolves is fluid and beautiful, and it’s all underpinned by those incredible breakbeats. Tame Impala’s music really influenced some things on the Bamboos album ‘Fever In The Road’, and it has gone a long way in opening up peoples ears to some really adventurous sounds.