6. Chuck BerryNo Particular Place To Go

These are the foundations, so along with Little Richard, Chuck was the stylised one, singing songs about American life. Riding along in an automobile and singing about gas stations and refrigerators and real life things but in a poetic way. He was like a rock & roll poet of America and he led the way for the Beatles and the Stones and all these kinds of people.

I just liked the opening line. sometimes the opening line can hook you in, [sings] ‘Riding along my automobile … with my baby at the wheel’, you’re in. But I loved them all so it’s very difficult. The thing about that opening line is it does capture and evoke something about America in the 50s right away. The American way of life in the 50s made it glamorous. They had Cadillacs and things like that.

I chose all these records as they were the foundations of what I was exposed to as a kid. There was nothing else but it all started sweeping through that.