ANDY PARTRIDGE

Swindon’s mastermind of song, in his own words, and by his own hand.

I’d describe myself as… pink, loyal, adequate.

Music changed me… because I saw it was a good way of getting off that council estate and seeing the world. I never showed an innate talent for music, it was always the visual arts for me, but it was a currency I could work in, and to be honest I thought I could impress more girls with a guitar. I went to the pictures to see A Hard Day’s Night, in my shorts aged nine, thinking, “Ooh, that looks fun.”

When I’m not making music… I try to stay away from music as much as possible. People who say, “Oh, I play records all the time”, that’d be fucking horrible, like working 24 hours a day on a perfume counter in a department store. I think you should listen to music when you need to hear it, like eating when you’re hungry.

My biggest vice is… I haven’t got any. I occasionally get drunk but I have to watch that because I’ve got a dicky heart, which I’m a bit disappointed about because I would like to slip into an alcoholic old age. The last time I was embarrassed… is 24 hours a day, every day, by everything. I’m English, it’s in the DNA. I think my parents embarrassed me so intensely they over-wound the embarrassment detection spring. My formal qualifications are… none whatsoever of any description. I left school at 15, never even took the 11-plus. I can’t drive either – I was born to be chauffeured! The last time I cried was… every day; it’ll be an advert on telly or someone will say something. I’ve discovered there are places on my body – like just on the right above my heart – and if I press them I can be wailing like I’m doing primal scream therapy, within seconds. I think I stuffed a load of hurt from being young into my body, which has caused most of the problems in my adult life.