Baker's Dozen

Artists discuss the 13 records that shaped their lives

6. Philip GlassMusic In Twelve Parts

The band had progressed a little bit, and we’d started writing our own songs. We used to play in the school hall. And in about ’87 Tom, who was the bassist in the band, his dad had bought this Philip Glass record and we played it in the school hall so it was blasting across the PA. We had Tom cycling round in circles on his bike to this really trippy, hypnotic music. I’ll always remember that, I wanted to know what it was. I made a cassette of it at his house. That was always the way in those days. I was trying to work out on the piano how it went, but it had all these small changes every few bars so I couldn’t really keep up. I’d try and replicate it and couldn’t really, but I got the general vibe of it. But yes, it was the trippiness of it really. So for classical music… it said something to me, whereas most of the stuff I’d heard didn’t.

Selected in other Baker’s Dozens: Rhys Chatham
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