"I wanted to deconstruct rock music, to make it sound like it came from somewhere else"

Over the years Wire have earned themselves a bit of a reputation as difficult contrarians - as illustrated perhaps most vividly in 1985, when they booked Wire tribute band The Ex-Lion Tamers to support them on tour so they could avoid having to play any of their older material. Which is why it's a pleasant surprise to see that, when asked by the Guardian's Dave Simpson to pick five key songs from their 40-year career, Colin Newman and Graham Lewis weren't tempted to choose obscure tracks.

On the contrary, they selected '12XU' from 1977 debut Pink Flag, 'I Am The Fly' and 'Practice Makes Perfect' from its follow-up Chairs Missing and 'Drill', the song that gave their festival its name. However, their fifth pick, 'Short Elevated Period', was perhaps inevitably taken from their newest release Silver/Lead - not a record I feel stands up to the stellar quality of their early work, much as Newman might like to think it does.