'THE' Interview
On special request I’ve collated some of the best questions I’ve ever been asked into this ‘super, bonus, bumper’ interview.
Thank you to all the press, journalists, PR’s, agencies, blogs, brands and people who’ve shone a light on my life and music over these years.
Tell me about your youth.
Youth to me felt like freedom – it felt like good friends and family, growing up with and alongside them. I moved around a lot with my mum, but still there was a sense between us that wherever we were we would find that feeling of ‘home’ together.
Books always seemed to keep me company. Youth felt like… playing rugby every Sunday, covered in dirt, being addicted to video games, falling asleep every day after school in front of the TV. Devon was home; we spent as much time outside as we could. It was small-town life. It was a good time. I felt like anything was possible.
Any childhood dreams
I wanted to be a marine biologist and then a ninja…
Who is Sam?
I find that question of ‘who are you?’, philosophically always a very challenging question. It’s something I’ve asked myself over and over again throughout different stages of my life, it’a actually a common question in interviews, and I’ve always found that there is a fluidity about who ‘I am’ which always avoids absolutes. I can only really answer truthfully in this moment. Right now I’m a singer-songwriter, A father, a husband, a model, a friend. I’m someone who loves his works, loves chocolate milk too and loves Japanese anime. I’ve spent a lot of my life in Bethnal Green in London, and music is like magic to me. I want to do many things in life, but I want to make a lot of great music along the way.
What or who inspired you to start performing?
This is a funny one – I had just started songwriting, it was a purely personal thing back then, and my guitar playing was pretty basic too. I was taken to my first open mic by a friend who insisted that I play, despite me being s**t scared. I got up there, a bag of nerves, and sung my songs.
My songs went down surprisingly well. When I got offstage, I was filled with this funny feeling, it was a powerful one though, and I decided that the very next day I would go to Denmark St in London and buy the most expensive guitar I could afford – my logic was, I would already be heavily invested so I wouldn’t quit easy – and play another gig as soon as possible.
I named that guitar – my first proper full size guitar – I was playing on a travel guitar before that – Heather, after the friend who made me get up there in the first place. Nice one Heather.
What makes you happy?
Doing the things, and being with the people I love. Sometimes I’m a bit of a thrill seeker, but I really value peace and contentedness as a way to tap into happiness.
I love dancing until I fall over - that makes me happy, and the cold water as well, that makes me happy. I’m become a cold water immersion junkie these last few years.
Whats your ideal holiday.
I think for me an ideal holiday would be escaping and going somewhere quite wild. Somewhere a bit more off the beaten track. Somewhere where culturally I’m going to feel like ‘oh this is really new’ and maybe a bit out of my comfort zone. I’ve always wanted to go to the Amazon as well - the Amazon jungle would be incredible, though I was told by someone with first had experience, that literally everything wants to eat you. Sounds fun ey.
What is your proudest professional accomplishment?
Occasionally people write to me, often strangers, saying that my music has really helped them though a hard time. Those are the time's that I've probably been the proudest of what I create. Those are some profound moments for me.
Seeing my first ever EP Architect chart in the iTunes chart was awesome too, it was like, holy crap is this happening. I had to have a whisky to clam down.
Tell us something nobody knows about you…
I once shoved so many peanuts up my nostrils because I was bored waiting in the car that I had to be rushed to hospital.....yep...oh life. I was 7 years old btw, just to clarify LOL. This wasn’t last week.
Let's talk about feelings. Are you an emotional person?
Yeah for sure, even more so now I’m a dad. Now I just cry all the time. I'm not really scared of emotions, but its taken some time to get to where I am. More on that later, but now I feel like they pass through me, I can let them come, collect them if I need, and let them go when they don't serve me anymore.
What do you want to stand for? What do you want to be remembered for?
That’s a BIG question and maybe something that time itself will decide. But if I could control time – as amazing and terrifying that would be at the same time – I’d want my songs to move people the world over.
Music is like medicine to me. It’s really helped me get through some emotionally difficult times in life. My songs and music are for the most part real human stories, or reflections on my own life experience, and they are all so meaningful to me. When other people listen to them, I want them to feel connected, held, encouraged and moved. I sincerely hope, my music, might, just might, help my audience live a richer life.
I feel we’ve lost a lot of that sincerity in commercial pop music, which for the most part is a lot of escapism, and I appreciate we need this too, we need to escape from time to time, but I’d like my music to be remembered as something that hit a little deeper, and maybe even encouraged some positive personal change or offered a different perspective.
I basically want to find my way to serve as much good food for the soul as humanly possible.
You’ve got a strong fanbase and have been hailed by key tastemakers in the industry. What does this recognition mean to you, and would you say at this moment that you’ve achieved ‘success’? (What does success mean to you?)
Under the umbrella of success for me comes, true self-expression, a passion for my art and involving others in it, the joy of creation itself, knowing your music resonates in other people’s hearts, community, experience, growing in the right direction, personal transformation and encouraging transformation and reflection in others, artistic development, a f*** ton of merch sales, a worldwide global fanbase using my music as a soundtrack to their incredible lives, enough money manifested from music that my children’s children will never have to worry about it, the best blogs supporting and believing in your vision, being turned into a meme and still having fun with it, never losing touch with why I started making music and writing songs. I also think considering conventional success, how many haters you got is a good measure of it. Sad but true. You aren’t an artist with a capital A unless you got a few haters out there.
Hypothetically, what would be your last supper menu.
The best meal I've ever eaten is from the The Clove Club in Old Street, London. Food that tastes so good you can't believe. I’d take the set menu and say bye in a blissful food coma.
Any weird sleep/morning rituals?
Currently CBD Oil before bed, Cold showers in the morning. Straight up, no hot then cold, just cold. Cold showers have honestly transformed my life this year. Try it. If you're not a morning person, like me, you'll become one pretty sharpish.
Do you have a lucky pair of pants?
No! But now I feel I need some!
Which song makes you feel cool?
Sea Monkey - Moderat / An after-hours, brooding song with a driving beat and a euphoric electro line that takes over two minutes to really get going. It's perfect for escaping into your own little world, or getting into your zone.
What are your views on modern masculinity?
Today I see ‘masculinity’ and it’s ‘modern’ definition as something that’s more fluid than it has even been. I’m overjoyed that there’s now a culture encouraging men speak about their feelings and a place for men to feel safe expressing them too.
Perhaps masculinity is in a more balanced place than it’s ever been in, a place full of potential.
There is still a lot of boyishness in male culture too, and toxic masculinity too. We resist growing up. Taking responsibility is hard after all. Or at least I’ll own that, for me I know it has been.
I think fatherhood, (I Can certainly attest to this) or some other huge life changing event can often bring out the best in a man, but when the lads are together there can often be a lot of chaotic energies which can escalate easily.
I also feel that masculinity is being asked to redefine itself, and because of that, perhaps men might feel a bit lost or disempowered or just kinda ‘in-between.’
There is a lot of misunderstanding I feel about what it actually means to ‘man up.’
We all have to help develop what mature, healthy, positive masculinity is, in relation to the feminine both inside us and outside. I hope I can be a role model to young men out there - to inspire them to ask the hard questions for themselves and help them somehow be able to find their own balance. It’s our responsibility.
(Written 2 months before our son was born) You’re about to become a father, do you think the joys and journey of parenthood will change you as an artist? If so, how?
Completely! I already feel a shift in me. I’m a very intuitive artist, one that works with whatever is happening ‘now’ right now in my life or beyond that to what’s happening in the world. So, you can expect a full lullaby album that helps little ones get to sleep very soon lol. I’ll for sure have a few different perspectives to offer my audience. (Of course by now you will know dear reader that Marley is here with us, and fundamentally Marley has changed my entire perspective on life in ways I could not have imagined.
Read this Journal entry for more
What’s one key lesson you hope to teach your new son or daughter – this can be about career or life in general?
Only one lesson…hoping I have a few to offer but if it was just one it’s that ‘you are so loved and can do anything you set your spirit to’.
You stepped into the fashion world almost 16 years ago, how did your modelling career start? Looking back, how do you feel the industry has changed since?
My story began on a day trip to London with my mum. I was spotted by a model scout there who’s working with Models 1. I was signed by them when I had just turned 16. Fast forward to 2021 and the industry has changed so much, the arrival of social media has massively altered all aspects of the job and I for one could never have predicted how important it would become – I guess none of us knew hey.
But in a way I feel the biggest change for me is, simply that there’s so much more of everything, and by this I mean more brands, more creativity, more competitiveness, more work, more opportunity, more ingenuity, more studios, more photographers, more stories, more models, more innovation and… more awareness too.
I will add that ‘More’ is not always better. But that’s a personal reflection.
Covid too has changed everything, but thats something for another whole journal post.
It’s been a compelling 16 years though, and things no doubt will continue to shift and change across the industry with quite some speed.
What do you think is the most important trait for longevity of a model’s career?
Ah well… The elixir of eternal youth… of course. You want my recipe?
Still, music business has changed as well, with streaming becoming an important part of it, what do you see as the future of the music industry?
The Music industry is still in shock from the great Napster revelation and though streaming services are great for the consumer, for an artist – especially an indie one - they are pretty dire.
However, I see things moving forward well, with consumers turning back to value quality, having deeper connections with their music, the artists that make it, and artists finding new ways to reach out to their fans + make a living.
What’s on your rider?
I’ve only been offered a rider once. It was a gig at the UWE summer ball and I asked for vodka, gluten-free sandwiches, Jaffa cakes, crisps, mixers, juice, grapes etc.
Sometimes what happens to me after I play is I have this huge adrenaline dump and so that night after a great set, I totally overdid it, ended up drinking far too many vodka shots, throwing up in Bristol train station, missing the last train back to London and getting a £180 cab ride home!
Extra funny thing about the cab ride home is that I fell asleep with this bag of food I’d bought from Marks and Spencer on my lap and during the journey one of the packets of antipasti I’d bought broke! So when I woke up to the sound of the cab driver saying ‘We’ve arrived’ I was covered in olive oil. LMAO
It’s embarrassing tbh, and cost more than I got paid for the show. So what’s on my rider? Anything but vodka….
Tell us your most embarrassing or surreal experience.
I was doing this radio show – normally I’m pretty chill, chatty and relaxed but for some reason I was just a bag of nervous energy walking into the studio.
I totally lost the ability to talk when I was asked a simple but open ended question and I watched myself fall into a silent hold, feeling like the world was swallowing me up, live on air.
I turned bright red and then suddenly exploded into a bizarre apology. The rest of the interview I babbled rather philosophically without ever really answering the questions at hand. You live and you learn.
What’s your relationship with your mental health, and what does ‘Wellness’ mean to you?
I’ve been on a huge journey with my mental wellbeing. It perhaps wasn’t until I was very depressed that I even had the vulnerability to acknowledge that this was something I needed to work on. Until this point, it was almost as if I was living with some sort of mask on.
It was only when I was alone that I didn’t have this mask on. It was a wake-up call. It affected my physical health and my mental health, which both deteriorated.
Having the vulnerability to say to yourself “you’re not ok” was one of the hardest things. This came at the time when I had moved up to London on my own and was quite isolated from family and friends in my early fashion career. It was intense and stressful and included a lot of traveling. I was in my early twenties basically just coping until then.
I reached a low point, and that was when I realised I couldn’t keep on living like this. From that point on a did everything I could to find out what was really going on. I went to therapy, saw many different holistic health practitioners and began working diligently and constantly on all the angles where I felt I had a blind spot, to try to heal.
Music came into my life in a big way around that time, and that’s why I attest that music is like medicine.
I’ve learnt that as life never stops, so I need to stay in this state of daily ‘process’ and have developed over time a substantial tool kit to help me navigate the challenges of life.
When it comes to wellness. The heart-body-mind-spirit relationship is really important to me. I also think of the opposite of wellness, that is, un-wellness - and disease which is a fascinating word to me when I think it is literally dis-ease. I think finding peace and contentment is a massive part of what wellness is to me. Wellness is being able to smile, bring joy into our lives every day, do our best, do the work and take each step at a time.
I also think I’ve become a better listener to my body over these years. If you listen when it whispers, it will never have to scream.
What is next for us all as a society?
Peanut butter sandwiches.
[Laughs] That is something I can get behind. Give us a hopeful statement for the near future:
No matter what obstacle you face, there is a way past it. Be brave enough to ask for help. You really don’t have to do it all on your own.
*****
So there you go! That was ‘THE’ Interview.
Hope you found out a little bit more about your friendly neighbourhood singer-songwriter and if I missed out a question you are burning to ask. Fire away in the comments section.
Enjoyed this, why not share buy music with a friend, thats how we take this musical ship to the moon and back, it’s a joy to have you on the journey.
Sam