The paradox at the centre of High Fidelity is that while pop songs almost always involve love, passion and raw feeling, the kind of men who are most intensely addicted to pop music tend to be a bunch of loveless, passionless, unfeeling train spotters. Hornby sees a problem here.

The book’s hero and narrator is Rob Fleming, a man who thinks you can’t be a ‘serious person’ if you own less than five hundred albums. His is a slightly unusual case, however, since he’s the owner of a specialist record shop and is an occasional DJ.

He defines himself and