Stiff Little Fingers, especially the frontman and main songwriter

Stiff Little Fingers, especially the frontman and main songwriter Jake Burns, were heavily influenced by The Clash and Elvis Costello . According to Burns, “what [ The Clash ] did more than anything else was give me the confidence, through its lyrical subject matter, to realise it was OK to write about my own life and experiences.” The group started to write songs about growing up in the Troubles in late 1970s Northern Ireland. Among the first Stiff Little Fingers songs were “State of Emergency” and “Breakout”.