Dear John, Hi, I am a 22 year-old girl from Italy and first of all I want to thank you and the band for giving us such a great new work that is Astronaut, I love the album, it is brilliant!

I am a fan of yours, and like you, I also started playing the bass when I was 16. I learnt to play the piano and keyboards when I was 11 and started writing lyrics at that age but then my love for the rhythmic section have led me to play the bass (and be the singer ) in a band.

The question is: how come you chose to learn to play the bass which is such a deep-emotion instrument? Did it happen by chance or was it a choice that you made? What are the feelings that this instrument inspires you when you play it on stage, or when you are on your own or when making a new record ... ?

Kisses, Alessandra

"I quite fancied being a lead guitar player at first (I thought they got all the girls, ha ha!).. but switched to bass after I met Roger. I really liked the idea of building an interesting, funky rhythm section. No one was doing that at the time, it was all punk rock, which is more of a guitarist's music. JT"