Jack’s taken back control

Singer talks about his comeback album after pressure of winning awards stunted career

JACK Garratt was catapulted into the spotlight in 2016 after winning the BBC Sound Of 2016 and Brits Critics’ Choice awards.

He was only the fourth person to receive both these coveted awards for up-and-coming musicians in a single year, following Adele, Sam Smith and Ellie Goulding.

But while they are household names now, Jack is still battling away.

His second album, Love, Death & Dancing, went to No8 last month – four years after his debut, Phase, reached No3.

Here, he tells us more:

What happened after that first burst of success?

I was “the future of UK music” and I was being compared to previous winners, and therefore similar to previous winners, like Adele, Sam Smith and Ellie Goulding. It immediately stunted my growth, the trajectory of the growth I was about to take.

It wasn’t perceived pressure, it was actual pressure from an industry, from the public and from journalists – a pressure that no one is taught to prepare for, because it only happens to one person a year, maybe.

And yet, when I was going through the pressure, I was expected and encouraged to either just brush it off or deal with it.

Why did you bottle it up?

At no point was I really given the option to actually express my grievances. Because whenever I did express them or I did talk about how confused I was and how difficult I was finding it to deal with, I was simply told, “Be quiet. You’re privileged and lucky and you just have to be alright with it”, and so I did.

I just kept myself quiet and it ended up ruining what should have been the height of my career.

What’s changed with the second record?

With my first record I was way too obsessed about what other people thought, because I was being encouraged to obsess about it – with the awards I won, with the opinion pieces that were being written about me.

This time around I’m just not accepting that. All I know is what I can expect of myself – and I expect greatness. I really think I’ve achieved that on this record.”

The new album is joyous, especially when dealing with your marriage, but also covers your breakdown while living in Chicago. Was it important to have the two sides?

I didn’t know I was writing something positive until I started playing in front of people.

I thought I was writing something that was intending to be honest, and at the time I was translating honesty to be something that was quite dark and baring. It was only when I started playing it for other people that I realised that there was more vocabulary to it than that.

The videos for the singles – Time, Better and Circles – have you choreographed, dancing and performing. Do you feel free of the problems you had after the first album?

The album is about a time in my life that I feel like I lost. This is my attempt to reclaim that, to take ownership over a period of my life where my confidence was at its lowest, my opinion of myself was at its lowest, my trust in myself was at its lowest.

And there I was expecting myself to make art that I liked from that.

It was a really difficult challenge but all I knew I could do was make it from a place of absolute honesty, and that’s what I’ve done.