David Toop

I had the idea to do an anthology about instrument-making.

— David Toop

Paul [ Burwell] and I had also got interested in making books. We'd been working with Bob Cobbing, the sound poet, since…

— David Toop

The Musicians Union declared you couldn't mime on Top Of The Pops, which is obviously impossible, if you've got a studio-based record…

— David Toop

Being a critic is a terrific method for killing your love of art.

— David Toop

I was associated with the Artist Placement Group in the early 1970s and David Hall, the video artist, was an Artist Placement…

— David Toop

I guess we all had that work ethic. None of us were rock stars, so if you had time in a studio,…

— David Toop

At that time, 73 and 74, I became aware that there were a number of us making instruments. Max Eastley was a…

— David Toop

One of the nicest things is that I still get, very ambiguously, people saying to me, "Oh, I'm just reading your book."…

— David Toop

I think I sent one [book] to Brian Eno. I don't know how I got to know his address, but I sent…

— David Toop

There's a sense of trajectories that are extraordinary about a life like this. You can reconnect with people and go back to…

— David Toop

The longer we live, the more we are obliged to confront the deeper meaning of what it is we do.

— David Toop

I think I was like [a game of] skittles, knocked apart by this wooden ball, and there's a strength to that: you're…

— David Toop

We drank quite a lot and Tony Harrington said, "We're thinking of starting a record label at The Wire; how about you…

— David Toop

I don't mean I give the same intensity to everything I do - if I did that, I'd be dead, but I'm…

— David Toop

New ideas emerge of their own free will if they are allowed to.

— David Toop

If you run out of new ideas when you are very young, then it's a problem of talent; If you run out…

— David Toop

I was at a time of my life of making choices, I suppose: am I a writer, am I a visual artist?…

— David Toop

If I'd thought, "I can't really play this instrument," I wouldn't have done it! But I didn't care, you know. I didn't…

— David Toop

I do still have dips of confidence or [can think] everything I do is rubbish.

— David Toop

Sometimes I'd like everybody who is stuck, or lost, or vacant to stay that way and keep silent for as long as…

— David Toop

I had ideas about music and sound and listening and time and so on that I wanted to pursue as an individual,…

— David Toop

David's [Cunningham] a very interesting character. He has more integrity than is good for him. So, everything he did after that sort…

— David Toop

I was working in, being a single parent with a grieving child of five years old. It was horrendous. I couldn't go…

— David Toop

One of the things about grief - I wouldn't generalise, because everybody responds to tragedies in different ways - but I had…

— David Toop

I remember I did quite a lot of interviews when the book and the CD came out, and I did a drivetime…

— David Toop