Spending the first 12 years of his life in Scotland, Bobs' early musical influences included The Rolling Stones, The Faces, Status Quo, David Bowie, Free, Yes, Nazareth, Slade, Elton John, Rod Stewart & Queen.
B.F: The only reasons that I can remember so many of the old songs is because they were on "Top Of The Pops" on a Thursday night & they actually performed 'live'. I never gave a thought to playing them but I analysed the buggery out of them; how this bit fitted there & so on. More mathematical than anything which in a way I guess it is. Everything has to 'fit' to get the end result.
Bobs' first memories of anything to do with 'rock music' were 2 posters on the wall of his cousins bedrooms. One was of David Bowie with the red flash across his face, the other was of Bob Dylan as 'Alias', later to be used on the cover of Dylans' "Masterpieces" collection. It was in 1981 when this chaned for Bob musically in quite a profound way. He 'discovered' The Rolling Stones!
B.F: I can remember it as plain as day. I was laying in bed one night & just remembered that "Rock Arena" was on. I reached over & switched on my small telly & was HIT by the intro. of "Start Me Up." It blew me away! Still does. The sound, the look. Everything. I knew who The Stones were & knew a few of their songs, but that was about it. After that night, I started reading about & listening to as much of them as I could. I thought, "I want to be able to play the guitar like THAT!" 
It would be another year before Bob got his first electric guitar for Xmas. In the meantime he used a cat-gut stringed guitar that his younger brother recieved the previous Xmas but never took to.
B.F: For about 4 years all my parents heard were Rolling Stones songs, usually copied from 'live' versions. My favourite 'live' footage is "Ladies & Gentleman, The Rolling Stones". It was from
their '72 tour of the States. Absolutely brilliant. I had it on video but it's vanished in the haze somewhere. I'd love to get my hands on it. It's it's available on DVD now but I recall back then that the video was a rarity. It's a fuckin' cracker.
It wasn't until Bob was at Matriculation College that he started to broaden his musical intake but he did remain rather selective.
B.F: I didn't start listening to Bob Dylan & Warren Zevon until college. I mean really LISTEN. Lyrics aside and so forth aside, even Dylans' phrasing is light years ahead of anything I've heard. He's one of only a few who's a poet, song lyricist & musician yet managed as well as anyone can, I think, not to be a 'rock star'. The late Warren Zevon's was the same. He had a great droll sense of humour . THAT guy was brilliant. He'd put the most macabre lyrics to the jauntiest tunes. A brilliant all-round musician with brilliant humour too. A class act.
His listening remained somewhat guitar-based & was never particularly interested in what antics the 'rock stars' were reportedly getting up to outside of their profession.
B.F: That's why I deliberately avoided the likes of Pink Floyd, Jimi Hendrix & so forth until I was in my early 20s. Everyone that were into those sort of guys were the types going around wearing marijuhana T-shirts, bloodshot eyes, smirking inanely & pretty-well advertising the fact that they smoked dope. I'm not so sure that they were actually into the music that much. It was more the image, I think. Tossers, really. When I did get around to listening to them I found them to be a bit 'patchy'. Either brilliant or monotonous. Just different tastes, I guess. I was listen to a lot of Cream, Blind Faith & Derek & The Dominos. Basically Claptons' earlir stuff before technology & producers got the better of him in the 80s. Luckily Stevie Ray Vaughan was there to carry the flag. What a fuckin' shame that was, losing him. Big Joe Walsh has always impressed me. The least likely candidate to join The Eagles yet, to my mind, he definitely took them up a notch.
Bob still listens to a rather selective range of music which generally goes in cycles. Due to his current recording dalliances & more recently returning to writing, he hasn't been listening to a great deal.
B.F: Anything to do with Mick Taylor, which is a fuckin' sight more than people realise, is about my only 'constant'. I generally go in 3 to 4 monthly cycles of just listening to one particular artist or band, except when I'm writing or recording. I don't actually listen to much, really, on the radio or telly. I don't think I'm missing out on a great deal by avoiding their 'commercial' nonsense anyway. Time gets in the way, too, of having the time to have a decent listen to anything much.
