Sook-Yin Lee: We're backstage at the Tibet Freedom concert, U2 is what you're hearing right now and I am with a couple members of Radiohead. So... [Thom dances] ...are you a big fan?

Thom: Yeah, I wish I could be there but this is sort of more important.

Sook-Yin: You guys... do you do many benefits?

Thom: No. I mean, this was brought up and I think this is about the only thing we'd agree to do, really. 'Cause everything else is a bit messy but this is really, really clear-cut.

Sook-Yin: You had contributed a track to the Bosnia child… Warchild album and then this one. So, these two benefits. Why was it important for you to do this one?

Thom: Because Tibet is the spiritual centre of the world... and it's at the mercy of our disgusting First World voodoo economics, and if we don't save them then they're doomed.

Sook-Yin: Do you think that, now you're in a position of influence, that you might influence other people, like people that might not be aware of the situation there?

Jonny: I think so, yeah. I mean, it's... I think artists – if I can describe ourselves as artists – are one of the few groups of people who are actually outside the confines of politics and of corporate structures and money-making, and can be heard, and so we have to do it, you know.

Sook-Yin: Do you find many people in Britain are aware of what's happening in Tibet?

Jonny: Yeah, a lot of people. It's quite similar to East Timor. We've invaded in a similar way, and again that's been very affecting in Europe. Tibet... in a similar way, yeah.

Sook-Yin: Are they more politicised in Britain do you think? How do you feel about the labour party having been voted in now?

Jonny: One of the first things they did was banning the export of cattle prods, and other instruments of torture which have been used in various countries. So hopefully it's the beginning of a lot of good things like that.

Sook-Yin: Touring the world... does that allow you a bigger global perspective of other things that are happening outside? Are you more aware, are you going to more affluent countries?

Jonny: I don't think travel really helps that much. It's more about information, it's more about bothering to read the newspaper. I think America is quite a closed country. It's quite hard to find out what's happening in the rest of the world. So... it's funny... it's supposedly a free country, but the media is quite restricted, so you've gotta look, you've gotta fight quite hard. It's better in Canada, obviously, but even there is a bit closed-in. The main solution is to realise that... is to learn how to read the media and understand the media, and understand that it's not just what they're saying, it's how they're saying it, and it's what's not being said, and learning how to read the newspaper and how to watch television. It's not a passive thing, it should be a very active thing.