As Supergrass return to festival stages, their frontman remembers his younger days, from the majesty of Spacemen 3 to love letters via mixtapes

This was a big thing for me: lots of recording off the radio. I’d wait for the chart show, and I’d know that Madonna’s Into the Groove was currently at No 3. I remember that pressured feeling of trying to hit record at the right time so you don’t get too much of the DJ introducing the track, and I’d build up these compilations. I did my own best-ofs – the Cure: 79-82 – or call them things like Dark Trip. I’d draw stuff and then go down to my dad’s office to use the photocopier and cut it all out, and print out homemade covers, getting the tracklisting really nice on the back.