“Many people simply don’t know what it’s actually about. Some even thought it was a coded message that we were gay. We were both geeks about WWII airplanes. The most famous and influential single bomber was Enola Gay [the first plane to drop an atomic bomb – Ed]. Obvious choice for us, really.”Andy McCluskey (327)

“I’d seen a TV program about the incident [the fatal 1979 confrontation in North Carolina between the Ku Klux Klan and a communist organization – Ed]. I was stunned — an average suburban setting with all this carnage suddenly transpiring. I felt it must be almost inevitable that that kind of rally was going to get that kind of treatment in that part of the USA. I didn’t want to point any fingers or assign guilt or ask why it happened. I was more interested in the feelings of the people involved. Their husbands and brothers were gunned down and nothing was going to get done about it. I was interested in this awful feeling of inevitable ultimate frustration.”Andy McCluskey (763)

“I’m more aware of women within society than I used to be. When you’re growing up, your mum is your mum and your sisters are your sisters and girls are for chatting up and taking to bed. Now I’m beginning to see people within a social context. ‘Women III’ is not trying to fly a flag for liberating women from the kitchen sink; the character is caught between the good things and the bad things. ‘The Native Daughters Of The Golden West’ is the other side of it, the cheerfully small-minded attitude of women who grow up to believe they’re going to be wives, have children and live in houses. That’s their holy grail.”Andy McCluskey (763)

“I’m more aware of women within society than I used to be. When you’re growing up, your mum is your mum and your sisters are your sisters and girls are for chatting up and taking to bed. Now I’m beginning to see people within a social context. ‘Women III’ is not trying to fly a flag for liberating women from the kitchen sink; the character is caught between the good things and the bad things. ‘The Native Daughters Of The Golden West’ is the other side of it, the cheerfully small-minded attitude of women who grow up to believe they’re going to be wives, have children and live in houses. That’s their holy grail.”Andy McCluskey (763)

“I was on a holiday in Monterrey last year and I found a shop that sold cassettes of speeches, where I bought one of Dr. [Martin Luther – Ed] King’s. We didn’t know that much about him — we were just eight years old when he died — but it was so gripping to hear him speak that we went on and learned more. We treated the project very carefully, because we didn’t want it to be a gimmick. We wanted it to be a celebration of what he said and did. When we sent a demo of the song to the King Foundation for publishing clearance, we were anxious about the reaction, but they approved it.”Andy McCluskey (764)