Yungblud has already nailed down a place in rock history
Doncaster- born MTV award winner swears he’s on a mission to “unite and empower the youth of today” and he gets the thumbs up from Nirvana’s Dave Grohl
The ‘ born musician’ description i s certainly a fitting one for Yungblud seeing as h i s d a d w h i s k e d h i m “s t r a i g h t o u t o f t h e hospital” to be snapped with his first guitar!
“There’s a picture of me ‘ six hours’ old on the counter of my dad’s guitar shop – straight out of the f***** g womb with a Beatles’ ukulele on me knee,” he told me.
“So, I don’t think I could’ve been an accountant or anything.”
C o n s i d e r i n g Yu n g b l u d ’s r e a l surname is Harrison, it’s surprising that his old man didn’t christen him after a certain Fab Four instead of Dominic.
“I grew up in Doncaster where you’re supposed to play frigging football , but I ’d much bigger frigging hopes to paint my nails and put a skirt on.”
Nirvana’s Dave Grohl – someone who knows a thing or two himself about wearing dresses – has hailed Yungblud as an “unstoppable force”.
Speaking at the 2020 MTV EMAS ( Europe Music Awards), the legendary Foo Fighter’s f rontman al so said Yungblud makes him believe “rock ‘ n’ roll is not dead”.
BUZZING
Yungblud was understandably buzzing during our Zoom chat because it was less than 24 hours since he had picked up the gong for Best Push Artist at the awards ceremony.
“I can’t even fathom it. I don’t know how we got this far. I don’t want to want to know how,” he said.
“When we played the MTV and Dave Grohl from f***** g Nir vana introduces you and says, ‘ I believe this is the reason why rock n’ roll ain’t dead’ – like f** k the awards in all great respect, MTV, and thank you so much, I ’m so grateful for it.
“But I don’t make music for awards. When the person who literally made you pick up a guitar says something like that… it’s unreal.
“I grew up in a guitar shop. I used to look at all the lads with their nose rings at 18 – and I ’d be like, ‘ I want to be just like you’.”
Yungblud – who once dated a Cork chick before his high- profile romance with American singer Halsey – added: “I ’ve literally gone from Whelan’s to the 3Arena in 18 months. I ’m like, ‘ What the f** k, man. Mad!’ It’s mental.”
Yungblud jokingly puts on an exaggerated Oirish accent when filling me in on his old f lame from the Rebel County.
“Even speaking about Ireland, man, talking to you, I f***** g love you lot. I f***** g love Ireland, man. You guys are, like, the best people in the world,” he exclaimed.
“I t m a k e s m e emotional actually, especially when we f lew over it, it makes me pretty emotional. I have such a love for your culture and love of music – and booze!”
Yungblud might joke about getting drunk in Temple Bar whenever he hits Ireland, but he prefers to get a natural high from life.
“I don’t do drugs, man. I ’ ll smoke a bit of weed, I’ ll do a bit of mushrooms. If it comes out of the ground then, like, whatever,” he said
Yungblud may not have been born with a silver spoon in his gob, but you could say – only in jest, mind – he’s got a ‘ f i lthy ’ mouth on him, seeing as he uses the F- word practically nonstop in our chinwag.
It’s easy to imagine any o l d f a s h i o n e d I r i s h mammy wanting to wash his mouth out with soap and water. Sure to be sure.
But t h e 23- year - ol d rising star i s also a real down- to- earth bloke – even if he’s on Cloud 9 following Grohl’s virtual , COVID- 19- style, pat on the back.
Yungblud insisted he’s exactly “the same” off camera as he is when in front of a lens.
“I ’m a f***** g lunatic who bounces about and just tries to spread love. I just am me,” he said.
When I asked what I should call him, Yungblud answered: “Call me Dom – Dominic i s what my mum calls me when I ’m in f***** g trouble.”
Growing up, Yungblud would land himself in hot water because he didn’t f i t i n with t he backwater t own mentality.
“I remember going i nto school having my nails painted and the teacher brought me up in front of the whole class and was like, ‘ Boys don’t paint their nails!’” he said.
“I faced all that s** t a lot when I was growing up. I felt like I didn’t belong anywhere.
“I loved Madonna. I loved Marilyn Manson. I loved Lady Gaga. Bowie. I l oved t h e s e p e opl e who would completely blur the lines of what was traditional and normal.
“So I vowed to myself, ‘ I don’t want anybody else to feel the way I do right now. I’m going to build another world
where people can exist and belong being themselves and going, Is there anyone out there like me?’”
Yungblud – who wants his music to “unite and empower the youth of today” – suffered from depression as a child and was diagnosed with ADHD.
“I remember my first – I know it sounds dark – suicidal thoughts at about 12, which was weird,” he said.
“And it was something I couldn’t understand or control, and it was something that wasn’t ver y much talked about at the time. F** k me!”
Turning to music as a form of therapy, a young Dom – whose grandfather jammed with the iconic T Rex – first picked up a guitar at age two and was writing songs by 10- yearsold.
“They were s*** e, but I was writing!” he quipped.
Yungblud still sees a therapist but said those dark clouds have now lifted – thanks to the music.
“When you see picture of a baby w h o n e e d s g l a s s e s a n d then they put g l a s s e s o n them for the f i r s t t i m e and they see t h e f * * * * * g world – that’s what I f e e l l i k e n o w when I ’ve got my fan base. They’re l i t e r a l l y m y blood and guts.”
He ran off to London at just aged 15 to find hi s f a me a nd f o r t u n e , according to profiles.
“I s a y that – but
I’m a f***** g lunatic who bounces about and just tries to spread love. I just am me.
I didn’t f***** g go in the middle of the night with a bag on my back,” he said.
“But I was like, ‘ I ’m going to London’. I was ‘ checked- out’ since I was 14. I was like, ‘ Get me out of this f***** g town’. I went to London and I was skint as f** k.”
Yungblud’s not exaggerating either judging by the bleak picture he paints of his early days.
“There’s my drummer, my guitar player and me l iv i ng i n a townbedroom f lat with literal live wires on the wall and water buckets – if I touch one of those wires I’m f***** g dead,” he recalled.
He was then whisked over to L A aft er s omeone over there heard him on a local radio music show some 5,000 miles away back in Yorkshire.
“We signed there and then nothing happened DOM’S EX f or a f * * * * * g year – Halsey again . Back to the f l at, nothing happened, no one wanted to know. And then something – I can’t even explain it,” he said.
Yungblud, who makes all the right noises about not wanting to end up in the famous 27 Club, sounds like a young man on a mission.
“The music industry right now has so much agenda in it and I want to f***** g cut the head off the agenda. I want to sever the f***** g head and put it in an oven and watch it f***** g melt,” he said.
Yungblud clearly has a memorable image being someone with no qualms about wearing a skirt and make- up, but is he straight or bisexual?
“I don’t want s ome f ***** g 18 articles about Yungblud comes out about his sexuality. If I ’m going to be on this f**** d on spectrum, if I ’m going to be on this f****** g checklist box, I’m probably pansexual,” he said.
“It’s not about what you’ve got in between your l egs – it ’s about a person. I think my sexuality i s an
HOLLYWOOD NIGHTS Youngblud performs in LA on the James Corden show ( circled) back in April and at the Life is Beautiful Festival in 2018 ever- evolving thing. I l earn more every day about it, the more people I meet and talk to.
“I would encourage that – I think speak openly, just talk about anything you’re going through. Because I ’m telling you there’s someone out there who’s feeling exactly the same as you.”
REFRESHING
There was no dirty linen aired in public when Yungblud split from Halsey in 2019. It made for a refreshing change of pace from the usual badmouthing and mudslinging y ou normally get from such high profile break- ups.
“I loved her very much and it wasn’t meant to be in the end, but she taught me a lot. She taught me a lot about my sexuality, she taught me a lot about life,” he reflected.
Has he been in love more than once?
“Yeah, twice in me life.”
Yungblud said he was disillusioned about the concept of love growing up in a household with two bickering parents.
“I ’d have my music on in the house when t hey were screaming and shouting at each other. My mum and dad were young and they’ve figured it out now and they’re more in love than ever,” he explained.
“And I always felt loved by them – but my idea of love was skewed. I was like, if that’s f***** g love I don’t want no part of it’.
“That’s why on the album there’s a s o n g c a l l e d
Love Song about m e e t i n g s o me o n e w h o c h a n g e d m y whole perception of what I thought love was.”
W h y album title?
“The album is
UNCONVENTIONAL David Bowie, Lady Gaga
and Marilyn Mason
called Weird because it’s about the weirdest times of our lives – forget about the pandemic right now, it’s an album for people. It’s a neat whiskey story about life,” he concluded.
“It’s a story of coming- of- age and self- acceptance and liberation, in terms of sex and gender and drugs and heartbreak and all the other twists and turns we go through in life.
“I hope it makes people feel like it’s okay to feel out of place or twisted or weird, because life i s weird — but t hat ’s what is beautiful about it. So don’t ever try to live it as someone else. Live it as you.”
Yungblud s ounds like an old soul…
Yungblud’s new album Weird is out now. He’s scheduled to play Dublin’s 3Arena in November 2021.