The Diary Of A CEO with Steven Bartlett - Example: The Dark Side Of Money & Fame

Episode Date: June 16, 2022

Example is a music artist, producer, writer and rapper who has been leading the way in the music industry for the last 16 years. A trailblazer and an innovator, Example started out as a rapper before moving over into dance, lighting up Glastonbury, Isle of Wight and Global Gathering among many, many other festivals. After only being able to harness his traumas in order to be successful, he quit his hard-partying rock ‘n’ roll lifestyle and found happiness and balance in his life, and found a way to be happy in his music too. One of the most popular live performers in the world, Example’s was one of the first shows post-COVID to completely sell out. His new album We May Grow Old But We Never Grow Up is out on the 17th June. Follow Example: Twitter - https://twitter.com/Example Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/example Follow me: https://beacons.ai/diaryofaceo

Quick one. Just wanted to say a big thank you to three people very quickly. First people I want to say thank you to is all of you that listen to the show. Never in my wildest dreams is all I can say. Never in my wildest dreams did I think I'd start a podcast in my kitchen and that it would expand all over the world as it has done. And we've now opened our first studio in America, thanks to my very helpful team led by Jack on the production side of things. So thank you to Jack and the team for building out the new American studio. And thirdly to to amazon music who when they heard that we were expanding to the united states and i'd be recording a lot more over in the states they put a massive billboard in time square um for the show so thank you so much amazon music um thank you to our team and thank you to all of you

that listen to this show let's continue no one signs a record deal and has a manager come up and go there's a good chance you're going to be really famous. Here's a pamphlet on how to not be a s***. Put your hands together for example! Money and fame can show you who you are. And one of the things you said is the person I was when I was 27 was a f***ing monster. When I became famous, I just went a bit off the rails with drugs and alcohol. I think there was just this one weekend at Glastonbury

where I just kind of disappeared for 48 hours. I was in an absolute state. What was the cost? Well, it's just not nice to see your parents cry, you know? Wow. I look back as it being

one of the worst weeks ever. And then I met Erin. Just watching someone grow a baby and give birth is like one of the worst weeks ever and then I met Erin just watching someone grow a baby and give birth it's like one of the most sobering experiences ever you tragically had a miscarriage on your second I remember I was invited on to Lorraine and I was meant to go on and talk about a single on a tour just before I went on they went we just found out you lost a second baby do you want to make the whole interview about that I got so many messages from guys after just going that's amazing you went on and spoke about that i've realized

there's been first times i've spoken about things that i should have probably spoken about with friends or family a long time ago if you were advising a younger elliot what would you say in terms of the components that make for a good life i've often thought about this so without further ado i'm step Stephen Bartlett, and this is The Diary of a CEO. I hope nobody's listening, but if you are, then please keep this to yourself. One of the things I always try and do, again, because I tend to believe that we are all a product of our, our like of typically our significant childhood events whatever they might be when I look at your story I was hazarding a

guess as well I was saying well this was obviously quite a key moment this is the key moment but in your own words what were those catalyst key moments from your childhood that ultimately shaped you to become who you are today? Oh, wow. I think in terms of work ethic, it's definitely from my mum and dad. I was very aware as a kid, you know, even before I was a teenager, how much time and effort my mum and dad put into work. They're both working class and they both came from very humble beginnings.

But I think the main thing I was aware of is that my dad was always away working as a kid. I was also aware that a lot of my friends' parents weren't together. You know, a lot of them were raised by just single mums. But then I also saw how much effort my mum put in. She didn't have a day job, but I could see how hard my mum worked,

especially with my dad being away. So I think the work ethic thing has helped me a great deal in terms of where I've got to um part not so much anymore but partly trying to impress them or you know feeling like I uh lived up to their standards maybe in my early 20s, mid-20s. Apart from, you know, like my parents' influence as a kid, I think mainly, I'd say that, you know, the culture at school in terms of music culture, London, I grew up in Fulham. I went to school in Wandsworth. And even though it was a really nice school in terms of,

it was a modern school, it was a technology college, I'd say the majority of the kids I went to school with all lived on council estates. And I didn't, but I spent a lot of time down there so I think that was really good in helping me not only understand um the different cultures and therefore as a result where the music cultures came from just like how other people live and how other people you know what people have to go go through you know like some of my best friends, their mums would have five jobs and they'd be living in two bedroom council flats

with like seven siblings. So I think that even though I didn't live that life, it was quite opening to see that. Did you enjoy school? Love school. I loved drama, loved maths. I was really good at maths maths but not very good at English which is weird because I've used the English language I manipulate English language for

for financial gain really but um yeah I wasn't very good at English and wasn't very good at science because I wasn't interested in them I wasn't really interested in religious studies because I always found it was like occasionally to the different you know religions whether it's Sikh Hindu Muslim Christian would be like little squabbles in the playground so I kind of didn't like that religion could segregate people so but everything else I was interested in geography math drama art music I excelled at and loved because you know I loved going to school my mum was always like you were an absolute nerd when it comes to school you like you couldn't wait to get there and you couldn't wait to tell me about everything you'd learned that day and you couldn't wait to get there the next day and

when it was coming to the end of school holidays you couldn't wait to get back to school so I think I enjoyed structure and I enjoyed either the attention from being a class clown at playground you know playtime because I wasn't very good at sport I was good at running in a straight line or swimming in a straight line but I wasn't good at team sports so I think um I I really felt like that school was good for not only my brain which was always a bit hyperactive but also I got this outlet of doing making people laugh by doing impressions why did you care about that making people laugh by doing impressions. Why did you care about that, making people laugh?

Because I just think, I felt like, I don't know, I've always enjoyed being an attention seeker. My mum said that when I was very young, like five, six years old, she felt like I was misbehaving a lot at school and she made a decision to put me on stage in the local drama drama group I definitely think my mum spotted something in me which was like this kid needs to perform and he needs attention and that's his outlet and that sort of levels him out a bit I'm surprised to hear that you were so keen to get back to school because I also read that you were at some point bullied by the other kids yeah I, I was. But I think because my mum and dad did such a good job

and sort of, I can't even remember any specific lessons, but I just know that my mum always made me feel loved and understood, you know? So if I was, if I'd go home and just be like, yeah, they took the piss out of my teeth again today or they took the piss out of my teeth again today or they took piss out of my ears again today or whatever she'd just be like son we are all built differently like we all you know she'd be like your dad had funny years when i met him and he's the most beautiful man in the

world as far as i'm concerned you know just little lessons like that so i just think there's so much love at home that whatever hit me on the outside world, whether that was down the local park, you know, little kids in gangs or at school, I just felt like I was mentally prepared for it. And then I think that kind of helped. It gives you quite a thick skin in terms of when it comes to you getting to the music business. It's like you have to deal with so much um disappointment like when I think that I've been doing this I'd say you know I got my first record deal in 2006 but I was releasing music in 2004

um I've played over a thousand gigs you know like most of my peer group have disappeared now um from say 2010 2011 when I think of like my peer group from around then like chasing status and sub focus is still going um but most of the other artists that i came up with have kind of disappeared or semi-retired or kind of just sort of like doing their own thing on the peripheral now whereas i'm still very much my focus is like I'm only competing myself I used to worry so much about competing with them you know and you got you got a diagnosis at a fairly young age for for having Asperger's yeah well yeah but I've been I my mum was quite good and I think she uh I think whether it was I don't I can't remember because I was so young but it would

have either been from her friends you know other mums down the park going Elliot's a bit you know on the spectrum and you know what's what's up with him because I was such a I suppose like hyperactive kid and I sort of seemed to flip between different personalities all the time but i also had these weird you know weird sort of like uh nervous twitches um and i would uh but i had a photographic memory for like even at a young age i'll be like just look at a list of i know like the american states and just memorize them very like within two or three reads or i'd get the trivial pursuit box out and memorize every single question in a box of trivial pursuit just so when we came to play with like neighbors or friends or family

at a barbecue I knew the answer to everything I think my dad didn't clock that I'd memorize them all but instead of telling everyone that I'd memorize them all he was like yeah my son's really really sharp he's really well you know things like that you know how does that sit with you now that that diagnosis and do you still well i just think every there's no way of knowing who what anyone is i think everyone can be a little bit of everything everything it's not it's not clear cut to just go this person is this diagnosis based on you know research by doctors and scientists and other patients it's very hard because i think every human being has a little bit of of something and you can't just say someone is 100 definitely got

this you know that thing so i prefer i can see some things in my eldest already where he shows certain similarities to me as a kid but then erin says no i used to do that as a kid as well and she's a bit mad like me as well but I think weird is good I definitely think weird is good and I think it's special and I think my mum spotted that so I'm kind of glad that I was never put into any special programs or put into a special school or extracurricular activities or even on light medication I'm quite you know I'm quite thankful for that because I've got friends my age who've been on meds since they were kids and are still on some form now you know and they think they're bipolar or aspergic or adhd and and i'm like there's

one actually a really close friend of mine who actually encouraged him to maybe have like six months off and he uh he's better for it now and he doesn't take the meds anymore he's like you know he's better at dealing with his uh let's say his demons and his you know his thoughts maybe used to haunt him and scare him he's he stopped taking the meds and he doesn't take them he's better he's better for it have you Have you ever had any of those demons, especially at a young age, that you used to contend with? I think the main thing, and I still contend with it now, is sometimes I just have so many thoughts. I'm not like a warrior.

I've never been a warrior because I've always known how to compartmentalize stuff and I'm really good with admin I'm really good at multitasking but it's kind of been a gift and a curse like it's either been having a whole say film script or scenario in my head going round and round that I can't seem to switch off and that might be whilst I'm in a meeting I'm not doing it now it might it might be you know like when I say I'm multitasking I'm like I can sometimes be in the studio writing a song but have a shopping list in my head that I just can't seem to get rid of um which is why yoga can be really good for me and like you know breath work like vimhoff style that really levels me out um but

for instance like i when i'm freestyling you know and i don't mean like pre-written raps that people go out and perform in a rap battle i mean like just like freestyling like rhyming i sometimes i'll be at the gym and i'll be there for 45 minutes and the whole time I'm there I'm freestyling in my head and it could be about what that person is wearing, what exercise that person's doing, what music's playing. And it's kind of a gift and a curse because it's great for, you know, when you're producing songs, just words being able to just fall out, flow out,

but also just like not being able to switch off sometimes. So I'll be in a room having a conversation with someone and they're like you're not listening are you and I'm like I'm really sorry but I've got a shopping list you're like okay what are you what are you getting later and I'm just there like Swiss cheese light Swiss cheese I've just got a very overactive brain you talked about failure a second ago you said you, you know, going into the music industry, there's a lot, you met with a lot of failure and ups and downs. After your first album, your first studio album, I was reading about your kind of, your feelings and sentiments towards it. It sounded like you were going to quit.

Yeah, I think you have to be prepared for disappointment in this industry especially because I'm about to release my eighth album and I don't really have any expectations for it other than whoever hears it I hope really enjoys it because I don't really know how many streams it's going to do or it's just you have to be quite robust in the sense that you may put so much time and effort into a song and Radio 1 or Capital turn around and don't playlist it. Or you make a song and think, this is going to perform really well on Spotify because it should get on the workout playlist or get on the UK house playlist.

And maybe this could do well in Germany. Not that I make music like that, but once a song's finished, you can't help but have expectations for it. And then to think that you might have spent, you know, I might have written it in four or five hours, but then spent six months perfecting the mix downs and adding instrumentation and so on,

or adding another vocalist or a feature to it. And then to think that that might come out and someone somewhere is like, nah, I nah not actually into this when i signed to ministry of sound there was so much pressure like you know constant meetings every week i wouldn't go to them because after a while they get too intense but it's like we're radio one uh uh discussing this in playlist this week we're hopefully going to go on the c list next week and then two weeks later we'll hopefully move up to the b list and then the aim is weaker release we're going to be on the a list and we should be getting 11 to 15 spins a week and you know hopefully we'll go in straight into itunes with pre-orders into the top 10 and we move up to the B list and then the aim is week release, we're going to be on the A list and we should be getting 11 to 15 spins a week.

And, you know, hopefully we'll go in straight in in iTunes with pre-orders into the top 10 and we'll climb to number one and MTV are fully behind this and you're going to do a live launch next week and Capital have just come on board with it. And it's all, you know, it's great when you're flying, you know, and obviously I was having number one singles

and top tens, it's great. But you realise the pressure that artists are put under and managers and then the pressure that the record labels are putting on themselves you know to compete with you know because they've got to bring an x amount of revenue as you know if you're in marketing or anr they're under pressure from your bosses and then the artists are under pressure from the label and then the managers are under pressure from the label and then the managers are under pressure from what the artist expects and it's actually a losing formula.

Money and fame, they often say, can show you who you are or it can bring out the best and worst in you. And one of the things you said is the person I was when I was 27 was a fucking monster compared to the person I was when I was 21. Yeah. What did you mean by fucking monster? I was just, obviously, i i hadn't tried uh

class a drugs until i was 23 which is mad because most of my friends and peer group in music and i grew up with were it probably doing it at 14 um and then i just think when i became famous uh and came into money, I just went a bit off the rails with drugs and alcohol. But I was also in a relationship where I was lying to my girlfriend and cheating on her. And I was just, everywhere I was going, girls were throwing themselves at me and people wanted to party with me and people were doing everything they could

to try and keep me awake all night with them. Whether it was girls or bad influences, other celebrities, you know. And then you get carried away because you're like, oh my God, I'm hanging out with such and such actor and such and such footballer and this model and this person and we've got access to this bar and this club and we've walked straight into this restaurant and got a table. So you just go off the rails a bit.

And I feel like everybody kind of needs to when you get to that stage every artist actor that I've spoken to whether they've chipped away for years like I did or just had this sudden overnight fame I feel like you kind of need to get out your system because it's kind of like it's not I'm not saying everyone has to but nearly everybody I know it's just like oh god how amazing does this feel like I'm getting free clothes and free trainers, and I've just been given a free car. I'm getting upgraded on this flight, and I've got this table at this restaurant that I couldn't get before.

I've been invited to this premiere. I was just on that television show with that Hollywood actor, and then I'm in this person's house. This person's giving me free drugs, and this girl wants to sleep with me, and these girls want a threesome and then all this shit so like why would you not take it because you get to do something that you know it's like a one in a million thing no one else gets to do this and you don't you don't go I need to do this because no one else gets to do it you're just like this is this is fun this is mad like my life's mad now. And I just defy anyone to not do the same.

I mean, I think, you know, sometimes like top level athletes, because they have to, their focus is being an athlete. So it's all about the body and their fitness. They can't do drugs and alcohol in the same way. So I think that's why a lot of footballers just end up like,

I'm going to have 15 cars or i'm gonna get gambling addiction because everyone needs some kind of vice i guess i mean all human beings need some kind of vice anyway i think i think that's how we're built we're not meant to just live squeaky clean like constantly like i think life's boring like and it doesn't have to be sex or drugs and alcohol but someone you need something you need something to obsess over that feels a little bit like naughty a little bit edgy what was the cost because I mean all that sounds great but there's got to be everything in life has a cost well the cost was I you know I broke a a lovely girl's heart and it took her a while to deal with that, I'm sure, afterwards. I probably upset quite a few people along the way.

I know my parents weren't proud of me, even though I was doing really well career-wise. There was a moment where there was a bit of an intervention. It was almost like, what have you become? We're not proud of you this is not cool what caused that I just I think there was just this one weekend at Glastonbury where I just kind of went down with my band and crew and my girlfriend and my sister and I just kind of just completely went off the radar kind of disappeared for 48 hours and then everyone

was like where is he and obviously Glastonbury is a crazy place to get lost in anyway and then I just turned up 15 minutes before I went on stage so I was still professional but I was like I was uh I was in an absolute state around like 2012 no 2010 to 2012 well it wasn't great when your family staged an intervention what does that look like in like real terms is that like a phone call or is that well no it's like sort of catching me off guard and sitting me down in a in a room you know and showing me how disappointed they are and how did you take that well it's just not nice to see your parents cry you know it's quite you know it still took me a few years after that to get my act together um but yeah I just I don't I don't feel like there's any real shame in it looking back like I'm not I'm not saying I'm

proud of it but I just feel like certain mistakes had to be made it's like in the same way I don't really have any regrets about anything I'm just like everything I've ever done in life however bad it is wherever I've hurt or whatever I've learned from it and I've tried to make amends for it, you know? Is there, in hindsight, information that you didn't have that caused you to choose that path? Like, is there something you now know that is stopping you from repeating that cycle

and just continuing to do that? Well, it's just like, I mean, like my mum always said as a kid, she was like, I was a liar as a kid. But she said they were like, not really lies that really hurt anyone. She said, I just knew that you had this overly creative brain and this imagination. So you would just take situations and just exaggerate them.

And she was like, and it kind of makes sense that you're a songwriter and you're a storyteller. And I get that. And looking back now, you never, there were certain times where I know it would really upset my parents and my mum in particular because she was spending more time with me probably day to day um you know that 10 like little white lies about scenarios that had happened just because I sort of enjoyed the fact maybe that I would get attention seeking could manipulate a situation that I could take a situation my imagination run wild with it and create other scenarios and I think that was uh it's something that I don't do at all anymore but

like lying as a kid and then carrying that through I didn't then obviously realize at school you can't get away with certain things because you know there's structure and there's teachers so it probably calmed me down a bit then and then I'd had like four serious girlfriends and I'd never once cheated on them because it just wasn't on my radar wasn't the way I've been brought up but it was just like I guess and I've spoken to other guys about this and girls this is like you have that first time you do it you feel bad and then one becomes two and then two becomes five and five becomes ten and then it just kind of spirals out of control and you kind of just like numb your brain to it and I just don't think there's no no one signs a record deal or gets into the music

industry and has a record label or manager come up to them go by the way there's a good chance you're going to be really successful and famous in the next year or two years. So read this book. Here's a pamphlet on how to not be a C-U-N-T. People often say that if you are late to lose your virginity, when you get into your adulthood, you kind of make up for lost time. Well, that was me. So all my friends were losing their virginity at 13 and 14, and I was 17 and a half.

So I was probably one of the last at my school school maybe it's just a part of south london but um yeah so i used to hear stories from other other guys at school about some of the stuff they were doing at 14 and that was just like absolutely mind-blowing but i definitely feel that because i was a late bloomer then by the time i was in my early to late 20s, I just went crazy with it because you're almost doing it for your younger self. You know? Yeah, yeah.

That was what I suspected because I was reading through and I remember thinking, yeah, if you're a bit of a late bloomer and then you get it full on, you know, you're in your early 20s because you become this star and it's thrown at you. It's almost like the forbidden fruit in a way like exactly because like some guys at school like you know the guys who develop a bit faster than the other guys you know they've got biceps and six packs at 13 14 and they're exceptional at football

regardless of what their academics like or they're the fastest sprinter and then they're really good looking and then i went to school with guys who slept with like 15 girls by the time they were 16 so chances are they get to the mid to the late 20s and they're not like oh I need to just go out there and go crazy because they've already done it whereas not only did I I didn't feel like I needed to go crazy but given the opportunity and you're presented with like you can I'm like a kid in a sweet shop you you know? Exactly. And then like, really, you're just like, yeah, this isn't me. You know, it just becomes a bit boring and mundane after a while.

Was there a point where you felt that, where you thought, I'm doing all this, but I hate myself? Was that 2012? Yeah, and then luckily I just, and then I met Aaron. What was, so, but specifically, so was there days where you were waking up thinking, what the fuck is my life?

Yeah. Like, it also is like you come on stage at a gig at 11pm in Manchester. I remember there was this one week where it was just like, I look back as it being one of the worst weeks ever, where I was just splitting up properly with my ex who i cheated on a lot you know moving out from hers i was pretty lonely because i was living with my step-granddad in like a an ex council house in fulham um and he was like 93 and the whole house was like it smelled quite bad and it was falling apart i mean it's blessing me was in great shape and for 93 and but obviously the house wasn't the cleanest nicest place you could live i didn't really have much cash even though i was starting to become quite famous and successful

it was like the money tends to come six months later you know you have a number one single or kickstarts is number three in the charts your festival fees will go up tenfold but probably not until the following summer and so still living with him so it's quite it's quite embarrassed to bring friends or even girls back to this place um so i just moved finally moved out from my ex which has had to happen it was a long time coming and then i was like i was did a gig in manchester came on stage at 11 and then I had to be up at 4 30 a.m the next day to shoot a music video because we had to catch a catch a sunrise and I was like why can't we do sunset and pretend it's sunrise you know so I can actually go home

and have a sleep they were like oh the director can't work that late or something and I remember looking on when I look back I've never watched the music video since it's a video called Two Lives and the lyric is actually called it's like two lives, I live in two lives don't know which side of me is where the truth lies that's the chorus so it was like a poignant moment recording a music video for a song

on about three hours sleep I looked awful in the video, like huge bags on my eyes and I went back from the video shoot to this house where my step-granddad was and just sort of sat in bed feeling quite lonely and then the next day doing like a magazine cover shoot and then going straight to radio one to record a live lounge and then going out for dinner that night for you know like for a PR press junket or something and then the next day was like another TV show and another radio show and then I called this girl to come around just because I

literally just wanted to cuddle you know and then was up there till like 4am and then up at 8am and then sat in a taxi for like an hour and a half to go across to like hack me whole time just in like I remember just getting to the end of the week just going like I can't do this I can't do this like and I remember saying to my manager I was just like

we need to start cancelling this TV and radio and he was just like you know he was like you can't cancel going on Graham Norton you know you can't cancel going on

you can maybe cancel no offence probably cancel going on Sunday brunch sorry Sunday brunch but you just got banned for sunday yeah and then and then you're almost like when's my next day off in eight days you know stuff like that it's like what we got this weekend again because i

at first point wouldn't look at the diary because it would scare me it was like well you've got um ibiza rocks friday and then you've got global gatherings saturday and then you've got um something in finland on sunday and then i was like i've got monday off no no no where you've got my yorker and then you've got ibiza again tuesday and then you get into each thing and you're just so completely knackered i'm fucked that you're just like okay I'll have a drink you know I'm drinking on the plane drinking we get there

and then you you can't remember the gigs I remember like you look at the photos and the videos and like the crowd were having an amazing time thank god that I can do this

even when I'm at my lowest when I've got no energy left when I've had six seven drinks but I look back on that and that was one of the worst weeks ever and then I think it was maybe like June 2011 album came out I know July and then I went to Australia

in October that year to do my first ever Australian tour and that's when I met Aaron when you're like sort of self-medicating to kind of deal with the pace of life or whatever it tends to be the case i mean just from sitting here speaking to musicians that you're not far especially when you like you use the word lonely with like a lack of connection you're not far away there from mental health issues like anxiety and depression and those kinds of things typically when you find yourself without connection in your life self-medicating stressed by just looking at the thought of this hectic schedule a lack of sleep i can't imagine

the diet was phenomenal no it wasn't i mean like i i've always been into fitness and running and i would like even when i was really really knackered like i've got my apartment still in in fulham right next to craven cottage and it's actually that that was a big help because that whole period is just like waking up every day the river gave me so much calm like were you anxious yeah but you just get up and sit on the balcony and have like i'll make fried eggs on toast or beans on toast and just look across the river and i live in the part of the river where there's no buildings opposite it's like the barns wetland center so you feel like you're in the countryside so that's a great escapism straight away from london in general so i feel like when i bought that um you know subconsciously i was

probably thinking about this peace and tranquility escape from whenever i'm home i'll close the door to my apartment i've got the river there but it was, I think I was quite smart in that I, whenever I could, I would go for a swim or I'd go for a run. Cause I remember my dad used to say to me when he was, so when my mom was pregnant with me, my dad was working, as I said, two hours up in Birmingham, so driving four hours a day. Cause it was the only job he could get at the time. He was working for a computer services company, Nixdorf Siemens Group. And he had alopecia as well from stress. His dad was dying.

He was pregnant with my mum and he was training for the marathon. And I think that stress-related alopecia is quite clear why he lost his hair given the aforementioned things. But I think running is what saved him from a very young age like that time alone and like whenever i go for a run to this day i don't listen to music i i most people go for and listen to music for fitness whatever that is my brain escapism and it's either swimming yoga or running it's the

only time when i cannot think about anything else and whenever i was anxious or stressed about things those are the things that saved me i actually think that living by the river and even if i did it twice a week during those stressful times just being able to get up and just go for a four mile jog i don't know where my head would have been like if i hadn't got that. I've been able to go out and do that and run specifically by the river, not through a city with traffic lights and cars. Straight onto the towpath over Hammersmith Bridge, along the river by fields,

over Putney Ridge, back through Bishop's Park, pretty much the area I grew up in. And then also I got to the stage where I was like, I was calling girls up to come over and it was like, who's going to give the best cuddle and who's going to stroke me to sleep like that's where again not didn't really make a conscious decision but looking back now it'd be like I don't just want to have like meaningless sex I just want to actually be held you know bear in mind my mum dad and sister all lived on the other side of the world

by this point they'd moved to Australia you know didn't have a girlfriend like I had my mates you know in my band who would in a way traveling with a band back then so i travel with a dj now but back then i traveled drums guitar bass and then five or six crew it's kind of like a little family on the road so that was probably better than if i'd been with just a dj that would have been quite lonely um but yeah i kind of feel like my there's an intelligent emotionally intelligent part of me i wasn't actually in tune with, was inviting girls over who were going to give me the best cuddle and stroke me to sleep. So I just felt, you know, in that sort of fetal position and felt loved or felt safe. You know what I mean? Did you know you were lonely? Like in the, at the time? No, I didn't at all. That's what I'm saying. But in hindsight, yeah, there's so many things about that whole period where I was so ambitious, and I was so resilient. And I was also despite what I was putting into my body, all things considered pretty healthy, or I certainly had endurance in terms of what I was capable of mental endurance and physical endurance. So yeah, so I wasn't healthy. I mean, I was, I just had endurance and physical endurance so yeah so I wasn't healthy I mean I was I just had I had endurance and I had stamina and that was probably from you know starting

the whole uh drugs and alcohol thing way later than most other people you know like say 23 24 had I started that at 18 like most of my friends probably would have burnt out way sooner but I was in you know when I wasn't on tour and I wasn't doing promotions I was at the gym nearly every day and I'd go to the gym and then for a run so I was in pretty good shape to be able to deal with these things and also performing for 90 minutes on stage can be like playing a football match and you know sometimes you're playing five football matches a week and i would always have a good physio after i got back you know so every three or four days i'd have a full body massage needles um cupping so on just to and then i would whenever i could i would spend a whole day

two three days i know it doesn't sound that much but just complete detox what what was it that made you go from being someone who was dishonest in your relationships and would cheat on your partner to being honest and committed? Was there a catalyst event? Was it Erin? Was it... I just think when I met Erin,

we just sort of fell head over heels with each other within pretty much the first night. And then she dropped me off at the airport and she was almost a bit tearful she was like I don't think I'm ever going to see you again I bet you've got a girlfriend in every city I was like not at all just like a few no I've got a few in London but no I was like you think too highly of me I haven't got a girlfriend every city and then she called her mum and her mum was like I bet he's got a girlfriend every state she was like no no she goes honestly I think we're gonna get married after we spent the night together um

but that was my sort of moment I was just like reset go back to who you've always known you were meant to be you know be the person that your mum and dad raised which is to be honest and faithful and and you were honest with her from the jump we basically it was weird because we got to know each other a lot over facetime and then she'd come to london for two weeks and go back to sydney and then i'd go to australia maybe for a week and then we'd speak on the phone for three weeks and then she'd come to london again for maybe a month and then i'd go spend christmas in australia do some festivals but also see my mum and dad and my sister and spend time.

I lived with her in Bondi. But because that time becomes so precious, you tell each other absolutely everything. So I think we'd been together six months and we knew everything about each other in terms of exes, worst fears, biggest achievements, biggest wants, desires, everything sexually,

all the partners we've been with. it was almost like a speed dating crash course of like, you know, when people are together, generally they'll be intimate with each other or they'll just laugh and giggle and go out for dinner, even meet each other's friends and so on. When you're chatting over FaceTime, it tends to be more like an interview you know so you end up oversharing what has Aaron taught you about love there'll be a lot of people that listening to your story and they'll think maybe I'm in the reckless phase where I'm I'm sampling all the forbidden fruit and then it seems quite clear from your story that you you met this person and as you said you kind of both changed each other but what what what advice can you impart

on on someone who's in that reckless phase and i think if people in a reckless phase you you either you're like i need to do this now and i don't know how long you're going to do that for but people if you're smart you can work it out i've got guys i know now who are like they that because you know they they work in high intensity high pressured worlds of like finance and hedge funds and i know a lot of guys who want to settle down but also on the side want to continue having these other experiences with women and i think they feel that they have a right to do that now i'm not sure if that's because of the mentality of a lot of people that I work in that world with,

you know, like it's a boys' club sort of thing. And that's just how it is. I feel like some of them, you know, like there's a lot of guys who seem to be happily married with kids my age, a bit older, and seem to have all these other girlfriends and flings and bits on the side if you'd met erin at another phase in your life though do you think it would have worked out no i met we met at the perfect time that's she just split up with someone like timing is a key

factor she'd been single for maybe seven weeks and i'd been single for maybe three months if you'd met her at say 20 i don't know five i know, five? I don't think so. If we'd met two or three years earlier, it wouldn't have worked. We met at exactly, it was almost like the stars aligned. The universe decided that we were going to collide at that moment. You mentioned she was a Gemini, and then you just mentioned the universe decided. Are you at all spiritual? I wasn't, and I am now.

Did she have a role to play in that? Yeah, I guess so. Because, you know, I used to just think I am now. Did she have a role to play in that? Yeah, I guess so. Because, you know, I just, I used to just think I was in control of everything. And I know I was one of these people,

I was like, I don't believe in luck. You make your own luck. Because that was kind of what my dad would instill in me. And I've never been religious. And I never used to believe in Zodiacs. But then I did used to believe, you know,

after I'd read some Stephen Hawking stuff, and then you start reading books on lateral thinking and the laws of attraction and so on, you sort of go, oh, actually, yeah, we are just atoms just bouncing off one another. It's just like, because we've got brains and we can make our own decisions, but that doesn't still mean that we aren't in control of the energy around us and the energy around other people and how we collide and then what things come out of that um so as soon as i got my head around that and then erin started

explaining the zodiac and when you were born and what time of day you were born and you know the the distance between planets and so on and what moon it was that day i used i guess i didn't have the patience for it before and then like she's like explaining you can actually yeah and that's why some people have certain traits and so on i'm not like i'm more into like spirituality since um you know i'd start doing yoga for instance and meditation you know like two or three times a week we'll do a sauna and ice bath put the kids to bed we'll do like 10 minutes sauna two minutes ice 10 minutes on two minutes ice and then you just come out just feel like you know you feel so alive um and then

the moment you kind of have kids and you're like oh my god this is other human beings that we made you do get in touch a lot more with your your spiritual side i think because you're like oh my god this is other human beings that we made you do get in touch a lot more with your your spiritual side i think because you're just like you know you could like science and spirituality can go side by side i think you know i think that the spiritual awareness of oneself actually comes from having a greater understanding of science and the way the universe works in general what impact has that had on your life yoga breath work and all that stuff i think the breath work's been incredible like so if it doesn't involve like ice or meditation even i listen to um there's a guy i know back in brisbane he's got something called the breath collective and he gets

people in like groups of 20 around to his house clears out all the sofa out the way and the tv and they all sit on the floor on their backs with eyes closed and it's like it's that wim hof style of you know like um short breath out like deep breath in short breath out and then holding your breath you know in that moment and you feel all the physical changes in your body like i'll do it a couple of nights a week i did it last night because i wanted to have a good night's sleep there's a lot of stuff going on in my head. But, like, it's hard.

If you'd have tried to sell that to a younger me, I would have been like, you're having a fucking laugh, mate. You want me to spend 10 minutes of my day breathing in and out in silence? Because I just didn't understand how to relax and how to be at peace with myself and how to actually deal with my inner thoughts and inner demons, you know? How much credit does erin deserve for this um a huge amount really she's um just watching someone grow a baby and give birth and then breastfeed them for a year it's like one of the most sobering experiences ever you know it's like it just blows your mind

like i just think the moment the rush of adrenaline and dolphins whatever that i got when she gave birth to our first standing up standing up yeah She'd been training a whole way through her pregnancy as well. She found a form of pregnancy HIIT training, which had been approved by her midwife and her GP. Obviously not crazy jumping around, but squats and lunges and so on and push-ups, obviously not much ab work. But she was reading lots of um research saying you know the the healthier the mother is you know yeah it's like if you eat nuts during pregnancy child has

no chance of having a nut allergy but if the mother eats enough nuts during it um likewise if she gets her heart rate up to a safe level that baby would be born with a like less likely to have a heart condition and there's other research shows that if the mother does an x amount of training throughout you know it even goes back to say the hunter-gatherer sort of period where a female might have to be on the move constantly or on the run whilst holding a baby and what that instills in the baby's genetic makeup when they're born like you know i'd have to find the research papers but there's stuff that she was reading about your baby have zero chance of asthma if you do x amount of exercise whilst you're growing that baby and

it can all be passed on like the science behind it's mental it's like when uh like your baby has a way a higher chance of starting life with a better immune system just from breastfeeding alone if a mother can breastfeed because the baby's saliva passes information to the nipple and then the nipple tells the mother what to put more of into the milk. So it would be like if the baby's lacking in iron or zinc or certain vitamins it's saliva from the baby's mouth will tell that to the nipple and then the mother will produce milk with more zinc more magnesium more vitamin d to to give the baby so which is why a lot of

babies have better immune systems when they're breastfed and not bottle fed so just you know i'm formula so crazy stuff like that but then yeah just seeing my wife like and she had no gas no epidural no no assistance no you know drugs as it were to help her through pain relief and she gave birth standing up and like the midwife's like catch your baby who who called it you called it no she did and then i was and then she just sort of collapsed into my legs and we just sat there and then didn't even look at see if it was a boy or a girl for like the first 10 minutes we were just so in awe it was like this all it's the most alive i've ever felt it's mental and like because apparently the um the tailbone actually blocks the baby's head

from coming out so human beings women should give birth on all fours or standing up. They're not meant to give birth on their backs. Because where the tailbone goes under, the baby's head's trying to come out. It's actually, women should be standing up. So that tailbone's disengaged and the baby can basically just fall straight out. Mad, right? Yeah, crazy. I bet you weren't expecting this today.

No, I wasn't. But there you go. Every day's a school day. So you give birth to your first... And one of the things that I read about was you tragically had a miscarriage on your second. Yeah, the second one. I think we got so... I don't want to say cocky.

So we're so excited. And the first one seemed to go so well. Everything from when she found out she was pregnant to giving birth. You're not meant to tell people that early on. But then when she found out she was pregnant with the second one that we lost it had only been five weeks and really you're meant to wait quite a bit longer and have your first scan and so on we went around told everyone and

then she lost it a few weeks a few weeks later just before you know like the safe date so that was pretty pretty tough i remember i was invited onto Lorraine Kelly show and I was meant to go on and talk about a single on a tour. And then they kind of blindsided me and it was just before I went on, they went, we just found out you lost a second baby. Do you want to make the whole interview about that? And I was like, for what reason?

They were just like, because we've never had a guy come on here and talk about it before. It's definitely not like a celebrity. was like okay cool so the whole interview became about that and it was actually it was quite positive because i got so many messages from guys afterwards just going that's amazing you went on and spoke about that because guys are just like woman's just lost a baby uh guys just gotta get on with it and deal with it by themselves just do everything they can to support

the mother what was it like for you well it's really tough because you just don't know how to you're like oh my god this is actually something that was living inside of her that has now died and i've just got to be there for her and i'm just gonna have to like suck it up and get on with it because no one ever really asked the dad how you feel how you feeling it's not in really in really in our society. It's not normal. Everyone just goes, oh my God, how is she? How were you feeling?

Just helpless, really. It was awful. But yeah, Erin's dad was great. My dad was great as well. In terms of, you know, how do you feel? How do you think you should feel? How do you want to feel? What do you think you should feel? How do you want to feel? How do you, what do you think you need to do

to get through this? Especially when you've already got a baby and then you're just like, how beautiful that whole experience was. And you're like, oh, could have another one. And then you start, is this going to happen with the next one, the next one? Yeah, tough.

Yeah, men don't, I mean, all of the, even even like men aren't really even taught how to deal with how they're feeling themselves right like i've actually you know doing stuff like this and doing interviews with either magazines or television shows i've realized there's been sometimes it's been the first times i've spoken about things that i should have probably spoken about with friends or family a long time ago you know because we're just you're like it's either the whole macho thing of you don't talk about that you know just get on with it like that's a woman's thing you know women discuss things like whether I'm not even talking about miscarriages I'm talking about relationships or you know when you look forward at your future then so you've got this eighth studio album coming out what what what what do you want the next five ten years to look like in

terms of your career i would love to accidentally somehow have a chart hit again just to remember what it feels like you know interesting yeah it's not key to me but it'd be amazing to have like a number one album or a top 10 single, you know, it'd probably be based on streams rather than sales in this day and age. But, you know, some, just because I want to remember how it feels. Have you forgotten?

Yeah, I've forgotten what it kind of feels like because it was 10 years ago. You know, I had like 22 top 40 singles. I think seven top 10s, two number ones, but I haven't had anything for for so long but i'm still going like my my tour sells out in a way that you would assume that i was still having hits but then you realize that hits aren't that important what's important for me is just making songs that go off when you perform live you know so you know i did an hour on saturday night there were probably

seven hits in there the other uh nine songs weren't hits but they still go off like they're hits people majority of the crowd know them word for word the energy is there you know the build uh kentish town forum sold out march the 7th i was back in australia by 9th i think 10 days later we went into lockdown in brisbane and the rest of the uk and the world followed pretty much like april that year so i played the last ever tour and then I played the first festival anywhere in the world after COVID. I mean, COVID, everyone was in lockdown in England, America, and so on. I played up in Darwin, in the Northern Territory in Australia.

I played 5,000 people. They'd had 23 COVID cases. So as long as you go out there with a negative test. So I was at a festival in October, October 2021. No, October, 2021. No, October, 2020. Playing a gig in Darwin, 5,000 people. And then I came back in just in my January, February tour. So I did one of the first sold out tours after COVID.

So I feel like live music and my performance is like my bread and butter. It's what I know best. It's what I do best. But it would be really nice to, you know, taste a little bit of success again with a song that maybe, like... Because I'm still in a situation

where I've got 40 gigs this summer. Anyone who follows me on Instagram is like, wow, amazing, you're having the best year forever. But I still bump into people in the street and it's like a taxi driver on the way here today he's like you're an example

aren't you what you been doing you haven't released any music for years I was like well released an album in June I did release another album last year

how does that feel it's quite it just goes to show you that there's some people think if you're not on Jonathan Ross or Graham Norton

or on Capital FM or on Radio 1 and you're not playing Radio 1's Big Weekend or doing Capital Summertime Ball then you've retired and then there's another bunch of people who hear you in the clubs or listen to you on Spotify playlist and have no idea even what Radio 1 or Capital FM is and then there's your diehards who follow you and know every move you're doing from your Instagram but you know that I don't tweet that much anymore because it's become quite a toxic place but you know that you meet people and they're just like I didn't even know you were playing but well you know you'll be like they'll be like oh mate what you doing in Newcastle you're

like I'm playing Newcastle Academy tonight they're like but I've followed you on Twitter I've not seen anything on you you know because I used to be known for tweeting quite a lot back around 2011 and 12. I used to get into a lot of trouble and have arguments and such on there. But you realise that everyone has their way of discovering and digesting and discovering, you know, discovering music. The same way we do with films and so on,

or how you read about, some people just read BBC Sport. Some people just follow a Twitter account that updates you on the Premier League. And there's some people who only find out about music from Spotify and there's some people who still only religiously listen to the Capital Breakfast show every morning

and the thing that I find is I just have to know where my fans are and what they want there's always going to be that group of people though that if you're not in the charts they think that you've either retired or fallen off exactly and they still think that's the case for me so I'll be like even when i got a taxi to brixton in february because i'd like to get black taxis mainly because one of my cousins a black cab

driver and he's like you can't you can't use uber um i like the tube but whilst i'm blonde which is for the foreseeable future the tube's not a safe place for me at the moment um it's a selfie central um and then obviously you have one or two and then that leads to 10 more and 20 more and i for the foreseeable future, the tube's not a safe place for me at the moment. It's a selfie central. And then obviously you have one or two and then that leads to 10 more and 20 more. And I don't mind meeting the general public. I love it. But it also, it's nice to just sit on a tube

and listen to music sometimes rather than having constant photos. But this guy was like, so what you doing? Were you going, was there a gig planned tonight? I was like, yeah, it's my gig. He's like, oh, what?

I'm driving examples of his own gig. I was like, yeah, yeah. You're taking me to soundcheck now. He went, oh, I i could have sworn you retired you're like my my eldest used to come watch you does that piss you off a bit yeah because i'm like when they're like my eldest used to watch you i'm like well if you just followed me on instagram he could still keep up to date with my song releases and he can still come what anyway i ended up putting all three of his kids and their partners on the guest list and then i got a dm i think from one of his sons the next day i think someone's maybe 26. it was a time of my life reminding me so you just realize that because you're not on capital fm anymore that certain

people if like i don't know they could be a painter decorator they could be an estate agent they could be a you know a taxi driver whatever but everyone has their go-to places for music and it might be like in your office where you work all day on they have radio one on so whatever's on radio one may dictate which festivals they go to or who they go and see on tour because it's advertised on there it's like you know like playing at v festival playing at creamfields is blah blah blah but if you're not if other people only discover music from their spinning class and whatever music's playing. So people message me and go, oh, your new single was on in my spinning class today. I didn't even realise you were still releasing music.

And you almost want to go, well, I've released three albums since then. And, you know, 11 singles, but you can't, it is quite frustrating. Was that, you left, you kind of left the, when you were with those labels and you were charting all the time with these with these these like big global hits you leave that game and then it was there a moment where it was difficult to deal with the what you've described

there where it was most difficult to deal with it where people are going where are you like where's where's the music like why aren't you chatting if you fall well it is you know what also is really frustrating is like so i've performed in 27 countries in europe um i'd say about 10 of those countries i've headlined festivals so there was a period where i was really big in finland hungary estonia uh czech uh slovenia slovakia latvia lithuania i'll be doing one or two festivals in those countries every year for four or five years headlining or second on the bill really really decent fees and then you I left Ministry of Sound um 2013 signed to Sony didn't really have any had no success at Sony I think I had one top 10 single album bombed they spent a fortune on it didn't really know where to position me and all of a

sudden all the gigs dried up in these countries as well and we were going back to them like with Spotify numbers and you know saying well he's still got you know four percent of his fans uh are in Hungary which is massive considering my fan base in the UK and Australia is my second biggest like four percent in Hungary and then it would be like you know know, 1% of his listeners are Poland. That's a pretty big listenership still. And then it was like 2.8% of his listenership in Colombia. And you go to these promoters and they'll just be like, look, his last single,

the 10% of his listeners came from your country. And they're almost like, yeah, but he's not on radio. And you're like, radio fucking dead, you know? Or, you know, I haven't been and done a chat show in Germany for a bit, so I'm not getting... I played the biggest festival in Germany. It's called Rockhammering and Rocking Park. So that's like their Reading and Leeds.

I played that festival three times. Unbelievable, massive crowds. I knew the words, word for word, like half my set. I had three top 10 singles in Germany. And then the moment you're not on radio they're like no i would like to book him but uh until he gets back onto radio and you're like well they know my other hits and like and there's people streaming the new stuff so this summer we got we've got benicassim in spain um we've got a gig lined up in portugal and i'm playing

amsterdam this friday um but it's been really tough like to actually go in and like almost we've got a gig lined up in Portugal and I'm playing Amsterdam this Friday. But it's been really tough to actually go in and almost having to present the figures. I see this with artists that have that meteoric, I mean, I sat here with Craig David and he's an example of an artist at 18 years old.

I think he had a number one album, something fucking staggering. And he's only like a year older than me, but in my mind, Craig David was like five or six years old because he was in the charts at the same age as I was listening to him. So I was in clubs listening to garage music. Yeah, yeah, exactly.

And he was on Top of the Pops. Yeah, exactly. Whereas I didn't have any success until eight years after that. So I was 26, 27. Yeah, and there's a 22 year gap between when Craig David, I think had his first one to his most recent album. Is there a thing of like, you basically start

competing with a former version of your success you have to i only compete with myself but and when i'm in the studio i'm only competing myself but the form of the yeah and my former person which is why i say to you i'm over the moon that i've got my busiest summer in six years um i'm i'm i'm so in love with this album, I'm still playing this album, even though it's been finished for months. But that's why I'm like, I'd love to just taste that chart success again, just once or twice. A, to shut up all the people who think I'm retired,

and B, just to remember what it feels like. It's almost like a little validation that my career is going to continue for the next five, six, seven, eight years, as long as I stay fit and healthy and I keep producing music and people still want to come and you know they choose one night a year they go out to a gig 10 of their mates get absolute off their face and have the time of life if they i want them to pick me for that then i've got a career i don't need anything else i don't need radio i don't even really need streaming um but it would just be nice to have that validation and i shouldn't be sat here going i need validation but it would just be nice to have that validation and I shouldn't be sat here going,

I need validation, but it would be really nice to feel that again. So every time I get in a taxi, it's like, oh, Jean-Paul, I heard you. I see you on Jonathan Ross the other day. I thought you'd given up, you know, as Australia, rather than just sitting there going, I've never stopped releasing music.

I've never stopped touring, but I've been touring for 16 years. I've been releasing music for 16 years, but you know what I mean? No. Slightly touring, but I've been touring for 16 years. I've been releasing music for 16 years, but you know what I mean? No, slightly frustrating, but I think this about myself. And when you're talking about having this kind of chasing the,

the former version of yourself, I worry about that sometimes. I think I always think to myself, especially now that I'm on drag and stand on the BBC, I think when I come off that, the cabbie who watches BBC one, but doesn't have a clue about podcasting is gonna happen well you have somebody you're oh you're the podcast guy and there's other people

it's an age thing for me someone's coming up to me in the street i i know exactly where they know me from by the by their demographic and if if a 56 year old male comes up to me oh you're on dragon stern yeah he has no idea that i do anything else or that i'm you know so so in saying that right so on my last tour most nights i come out after our stage before i get on the tour bus and you know my tour manager will be out and they'll be like look you'll be out in about an hour if you want to wear i know it's cold put a hoodie on you know it's like you make sure to you know i say just go and give them a load of uh monster munch or whatever you know so he goes out with go and give them a load of Monster Munch or whatever.

So he goes out with a big whatever's left on our rider. Monster Munch, maybe a couple of beers. He checks their age. So you might have 200 people waiting after the gig. And then by the time I come out at 11, 30, 12, there might only be 20. But I'll always say to them, where did you buy this ticket from and why did you buy this ticket? It's just there's a little bit of market research. And all the young kids are like, we saw it advertised on your Instagram.

And pretty much anyone over 30, 40 years old, they saw a billboard on a bus stop or on a train station or their friend forwarded them a link from gigs and tours or bands in town on Facebook. So even though I'm not on bands in town, I don't go on Facebook much. I don't really decide

when my posters are put up that's like the touring company the promotions company decide that as long as these people know where to find me that's great and then they come to the gig and then maybe there's like four or five songs they haven't heard that I've released in the last two years but chances are the two of them they'll fall in love with and go back and continue to stream those songs or they add it to their playlist there's a need though to try to detach a little bit from the external validation driving your self-opinion i guess because as much as it can be like a good driver of ambition and competition and having something to aim for is great you don't want to be dragged like because because i can see how an artist who is used to getting number ones all

the time could get a number two and feel like shit because it's a number two whereas really without all the number ones number two is unbelievable yeah i was saying this earlier these these here are my chart top tens yeah all of those those are my three number twos that was actually unorthodox with wretch yeah yeah that was we'll be coming back with calvin and that was say nothing which came out just after that and even looking back it's just like like to go from six to three from two to one it would have been nice if those last days just went one one one like the difference you know like the difference between that one and number one was about 267 downloads on itunes and the difference in that one that one was maybe like 400 and something.

And it's like, I don't know. It's nice to say, it's amazing to say I've had two number one singles and a number one album out of everything that I've done in my career. But it'd be extra nice to say I've had four number ones. You know what I mean? But that's exactly what I mean.

You're never going to be... I don't lose sleep over it. What can you tell me about this album? When I listen to something, I need some kind of flavour of this eighth album. I've never done drum and bass before. And there's two drum and bass tracks on it. Okay.

I used to, when I started emceeing, when I was like 15, it was mainly over UK Garage or Garage. And the 10 tracks on this album are garage um and then there's three drill tracks um with probably the best spitting i've ever done there's like i'll play you a song afterwards but there's a track where i'm just spitting straight for three minutes uh we shot the first half of the video in a shipping container yard in brisbane which being brisbane we got to use for free so complete no regulations just like yeah mate uh open the gate for you we'll be back at

eight just go where you want just don't don't don't break a leg or anything don't anything stupid um so we shot this video which i directed in a container yard and one of my mates who's in construction we shot the second half of the video on the roof of his new apartment block where i'm standing on top of the lift shaft and then we've got drone footage going around me um very cost effective video and it's basically just me rapping solidly for three minutes and i think it's probably the best rapping spitting i've ever done i based it all on buster rhymes like i used you know from back when I was like 17 so I'm just hoping, well I know that when people hear this album they're going to go

fuck he sounds good, he sounds comfortable, he sounds the most confident best performances I've ever heard him do, I truly believe that and I can't wait for people to hear it because it's also like you associate drill music

with uh gangs and knife crime and selling drugs and i've basically just taken inspiration from the beats um and just done elliot you know i'm being true to myself i'm not that was just what i've always done it's just like i used to feel like as I was saying she was just off air before I used to feel like I was this uninvited guest to rap and hip-hop because I felt that you needed certain credentials you know to do it and then you slowly realize that no it's just like an art form as long as you're respectful of the culture it's just like what are you doing with that that music what story are you telling and you've always just got to tell your own story i guess having been through all of this elliot if i may call you elliot having been through the fame the you know the ups and downs of the music industry the you know the sex the drugs the rock and roll all of it and also the family the kids and all of

that if you were advising a younger Elliot who might be listening to this and what actually matters in terms of the components that make for a good life what would you say now in hindsight having tasted it all right now I mean like being a dad is so so important to me and so rewarding especially once the little one enyo who's now four he was a bit later with the speech the fact he can now speak it's like my young my eldest evander he was speaking like 18 months he was saying words and then our youngest didn't really start speaking till he was three but now it's not only just being able to communicate with them but then listen to them speak to each other there's bonkers stuff that comes out of their

mouth it's just like it's the most rewarding thing of the day i'll spend most of the day just writing down quotes they've said and send them to my mom and dad and my sister or to erin's family just like you won't believe and like the stuff that comes out the mouth that's that's like for me it's like i love cooking i love food i love fine dining i love eating out like food is so important to me training is so important to me sleep is important to me sex is important to me being a dad's important to me and if i'm being totally honest like i make music for a living but i could right now i love being on stage but if it was someone was like you've got another year now you're not going to write one song or do another gig I'd be totally happy with that as long as I

had all the other things interesting we have a we have a closing tradition on this podcast where the last guest writes the question for the next guest okay and I I read it now so I haven't seen this before um it says of all the achievements in your life which do you think made the biggest impact on another on another i'm gonna guess they mean also everything you've achieved another person yes of all the achievements in your life which do you think made the biggest impact on another person um that's interesting it's a really good question two minutes in your life which one do you mean um that is a really interesting question well do you know what what i would say actually and i could probably apply this to a few i'll apply it to two people rather than just one person in particular, is there's a guy, three people in particular.

So there was a guy called David Stewart, who was my guitarist for three and a half years. Very different to me, he was like a private school educated kid. But, and, you know, grew up in in money if you like near near westbourne grove and we used to rib him quite a bit he was like six seven years younger than all of us but he was a great kid really good guitarist really good uh keyboard player great singer good looking he always wanted to make it as a solo artist and for whatever reason this was around the same time ed sheeran started blowing up where it's like he could be the best looking kid in the world but

you know no offense ed's a really good mate of mine but you know i mean ed's not a model um he's not that justin timberlake cut but david stuart fair play to him like we spent a lot of time writing songs together i would try and hone his lyrics he was amazing with melody and he's now officially the most successful songwriter in the world in terms of streams. So he wrote the last three Jonas Brothers singles and he wrote Dynamite for BTS, which is I think the third or fourth most streamed song of all time.

It was the most streamed song of the last year. I'm not saying he owes that to me, but what I'm saying is I know for a fact that his years on the road with me and the time he writing songs with him was instrumental in his drive and ambition and his craft I feel like he may have gone on to do this anyway but he you know he he definitely I feel like success he's more success and I'm really proud of him like that he's now the most successful songwriter in the world. And then there's like my guitarist who replaced him,

another guy called Kai Kai, he's gone on to be very successful. Composer, he left me to go and play guitar with Dua Lipa for a few years when she was blown up. And my drummer, he was playing with The Streets and Lily Allen and played with me for five years. He went on to help put together Ed Sheeran's live show and create the technology behind his loop pedals. Oh, yeah, yeah.

And then my playback guy, he's the guy who runs the laptops, which run alongside the live musicians. He's gone on to put together huge shows for Kygo in Las Vegas. So I feel like nearly everybody who's worked alongside with me, I've learned from them. And then, but they've, I guess what I'm saying is I'm glad that they've all gone on to do huge things.

They haven't gone on to just be standard session musicians. You know, like my bass player, Andy Sheldrake's now a producer in his own right. He produced all night. So that song was just me and him. You know, so my biggest song, I suppose from the second year of my career was down to him like everybody there's not one person I've worked with closely uh in a musical level you know in terms of what people regard as session musicians most session musicians just go on to play for other bands on the road for

eternity you know earning three four hundred pounds a gig and a plane into their 50s or 60s just getting by whereas all the guys who've been part of my band who basically my brothers on tour my family all been made incredible success of themselves that's dope and i mean that's that that says a lot about the environment that you guys have together when you're together and like yeah i'm quite proud of that you know yeah yeah because i didn't try i didn't intend to do that it's just obviously it was clearly a nice place to work and was inspirational and was very creative and ambitious and they've parted company with me all on good terms and have gone i'm not just going to sit back i'm just going to go and do what elliot's done in my own way. And in David Stewart's case,

it's like stratospheric, you know, like produced and wrote the biggest song in the world that year for a Korean pop band. Mental. Mad. Elliot, example. Thank you. Thanks for having me.

I've loved this. Yeah. I mean, these conversations are all so, so unbelievably different but i think your honesty and like there's a real sort of overwhelming sense of inspiration i get from watching a man go on a journey and change in so many really fundamental ways in terms of their character their craft their art and even like their emotional awareness and their ability to like be in touch with their

emotions tends to be the case that women can be the catalyst certainly for me it was you meet the right you're very easy to speak to though i must say you're you uh you give me a real sense of safety and i can talk about whatever i want and there's no agenda which is really interesting yeah because you know it's funny because i write these questions down that i actually don't write any questions down but i write like bullet points, things to remember. And then I genuinely go in the direction that I'm interested in. But so many things you talk about, even from breathwork,

my girlfriend is a breathwork practitioner. So I'm doing breathwork all the time these days. You know, the Wim Hof thing, we've just booked a retreat to do Wim Hof's ice thing. See, I had no idea about any of this. Yeah, exactly. So that's why like when you're saying it, I find it really intriguing to like probe in around there.

But it's all led by curiosity and there's so much in your story that is really really inspiring to me and I'm actually the most inspiring thing for me is what happens next so the most inspiring thing

to me is seeing how your eighth album plays out how you continue to like move with the changing times and changing platforms and who that that creative and artist becomes

but yeah thank you for your time today I love these conversations and it's been super energizing for me and i know it will be for everybody that's listened so thank you Bye.