1 MY DAD’S OLD GUITAR MY dad played guitar a little and, when I was about 12, I was listening to a lot of guitar bands like Ocean Colour Scene, Oasis and all the Britpop bands. I desperately wanted to play guitar so one day I took my dad’s guitar up to my bedroom – I’m not sure I even asked – and started to try and teach myself. I found that I loved it. I would come home from school every day and play it until my fingers bled because I was so determined to play along to my favourite songs. It eventually got to the point where I was able to play along to them which set me off writing my own so it’s possible that if my dad hadn’t had that guitar in the house I might never have started to write my own songs.