Idon’tfancy alockdown 50thsoi’ll juststay 49
Singer more gets reflective thanks to the pandemic
GARY Barlow turns 50 next week but he says he’s delaying the milestone birthday by a year. A birthday in the middle of winter, shortly after Christmas means he hates celebrating it even in normal circumstances.
Add a pandemic and the Take That star is beside himself.
He laughed and said: “In a normal year it’s just the most terrible time of the year. No one wants to go out. It’s freezing cold.
“I ’m dreading it now. I was looking forward to it at one point.”
So he is putting back celebrations of his 50th until 2022 – and reckons that means he can be a year younger from now on too.
He said: “The best idea for anyone who has significant birthdays within this next year is to just delay it a year.
“Be 49 for another year and then celebrate being 50 in 2022. That’s the best idea. And hope people forget about that year in the future.
“So you’ll always be younger – great idea.”
T h e s i n g e r - s o n g w r i t e r i s i n a contemplative place ri ght now but reckons he has been for a while, partly because of Take That.
He said: “I ’ve been reflective for a few years. I don’t know whether it’s just 40s or going into 50s.
“O f t e n musi c
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it’s a
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b e reflective. A couple of years ago we did a 30- year anniversary, so you’re forced to listen back to all the multi- tracks and hear voices of people you haven’t seen for 20 years.
“I think the crazy things that have happened this year make you reflective because you want everything to get back to normal. So, you’re trying to remember what normal was and how it felt.
“It might be just a getting older thing, because our oldest child is 20 now. Again, that forces you to be reflective. I ’m just in a reflective time of life now.”
This year on his real birthday – January 20 – the Patience hitmaker will be busy doing The Crooner Sessions, which have returned in lockdown three. They go out on Gary’s Youtube channel every Monday, Wednesday and Friday.
They began during the first lockdown and l a st ye ar h e t e amed up wit h KT Tunstall and All Saints.
On Monday, he sang Rhythm of My Heart with Rod Stewart and there are
TARTAN IT UP Gary sings with Rod Stewart for The Crooner Sessions on Youtube lots more guests to come. Last year, his wife Dawn Andrews hit 50 and he treated the former backing dancer to a break in Lake Como, Italy, with kids Daniel, 20, Emily, 18, and 11- year- old Daisy.
Gary said even if he could travel now, he wouldn’t, adding: “I don’t want to get on a plane at the moment, if I ’m honest.”
He had planned a big party, playing the London Palladium, and wanted to include his loyal fans in celebrations for his 50th.
Gary said: “I was going to selectively pick 2000 people from our fan club. So I ’m going to do it the following year.”
He’s fine with being 49 for another year because he believes his career helps him stay youthful.
Before Christmas, Music Played By Humans, his fifth s ol o al bum and f i r st i n se ven years, debuted at No1. It was his third solo UK chart- topper.
He said: “I think this keeps me young. I still feel so excited by what I do, you know, especially when I ’m in the middle of a project, I can’t wait to get into the studio every day.
“I still look through a child’s eyes at what this is. I just love it so much. It definitely keeps me young. I ’m at a very nice time of my life.”
Gary admitted the Covid pandemic is starting to wear a little thin and longs to “start getting back to normal”.
For now he’ ll offer “three minutes of light every day” for his fans once again with the sessions.
Asummer solo tour is in the diary y but he doesn’t know if it will be able to go ahead yet. The pandemic has affected his daughter Emily too. She had plans to go to university but took a year out to avoid doing her courses online.
Gary said: “I don’t blame her. I think k we put t oo much pressure on ki ds achieving things.”
Gary left school at 16. He had been performing in clubs since he was 15 and d two years l ater had Take That built around him, with Robbie Williams, Mark Owen, Howard Donald and Jason Orange winning spots after auditions. The group have since had 12 No1 singles and eight No1 albums in the UK.
Now a trio – j ust Gar y, Mark and Howard – there are plans to reconvene in 2023. Their songs have been used in a film, Greatest Days, which they hope will be made this year.
He sai d: “I ’m hoping when t hat’s released it’s a good reason to get us back out on tour.” The film is based on the stage st age musical The Band , about a group of women who get back together to see their favourite group after 26 years. years
Sixteen of the group’s hits were used in the stage version which featured winners of the BBC talent contest Let it Shine.
Gary, a judge on The X Factor from 2011 to 2013, said: “The best thing is – I ’m not in it! I think we may get a cameo role somewhere near the end, but that will be it.”
Gary has plenty in the pipeline to keep him focused for the next couple of years but he insisted he rarely analyses his success.
He said: “I never try and analyse what I do too much because I feel like if I really understood it, I ’d do it differently. I just do what I do and hope for the best.
It’s all you can do.”
I still look through a child’s eyes. I love it so much. It keeps me young GARY BARLOW ON HIS LOVE OF CREATING AND PERFORMING MUSIC