Music:
An assemblage of heroes and misfits: The Decemberists, D. Bowie, L. Reed, T. Rex, M Ward, Bright Eyes, Magnetic Fields, Belle & Sebastian, Neutral Milk Hotel (Where are you, Jeff Magnum?), The Smiths, The Mountain Goats, Joanna Newsom, Cass McCombs, Antony and the Johnsons, The New Pornographers, Jason Molina and Co., E. Costello, The Kinks, Will Oldham, Neil Young, Sparklehorse, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah
Movies:
Velvet Goldmine, A Clockwork Orange, both Kill Bills, Waiting for Guffman, Young Frankenstein, Trainspotting, Lost in Translation, Brokeback Mountain, Hedwig and the Angry Inch, anything from the John Hughes oeuvre, The Goonies, Spinal Tap, The Princess Bride, Wes Andersen, 80's movies with dark, bizarre puppetry
Books:
Fiction: Nabokov, Salinger, Joyce, Haruki Murakami, Zadie Smith, Chuck Palahniuk, Salman Rushdie, H.S. Thompson Non-Fiction: Joan Didion, David Sedaris