Adele ‘ I HAVE A VERY DARK SIDE
After Adele spoke with searing honesty about her post-natal depression, Louise Gannon, who has interviewed her on two occasions, reveals how it’s typical of the superstar who refuses to play the fame game
WHEN ADELE SPOKE OUT last week about the post-natal depression that has put her off having any more children, even those closest to her were stunned by her revelation.
For many – including key executives from Sony Music who recently handed her a £90 million record deal – it explained the reason behind the 28-year-old’s ‘lost years’, which came shortly after her son Angelo’s birth in 2012.
In true Adele style, the singer, who grew up on a South London council estate, spoke with brutal honesty about the depression that has plagued her.
In an interview with Vanity Fair, she said, ‘I have a very dark side. I’m very available to depression. I can slip in and out of it quite easily. It started when my grandad died when I was about 10 and, while I never had a suicidal thought, I have been in therapy, lots.
‘I’m too scared [to have another baby]. I had really bad postpartum depression after I had my son, and it frightened me... I didn’t talk to anyone about it. I was very reluctant.
‘I think it’s the bravest thing not to have a child; all my friends and I felt pressurised into having kids, because that’s what adults do.’
Her revelation has put a fresh perspective on her disappearance from the radar for two years after she became a mother and the previously unexplained long delay on her third album, 25, which was originally due out two years before its 2015 release.
One long-term associate said, ‘Adele never ceases to blow everyone’s mind. There was a period when no one knew what was going on. The music wasn’t happening, there were no explanations and no communication. There was a point when people in the industry thought there would never be another album.
‘She didn’t explain any of this at the time. We thought she was blissfully happy. People would have understood and sympathised [with her depression], but we also understand that Adele is someone with great integrity about her feelings and emotions and she needs to completely go through them, understand them and deal with them before she lets the world in on her most private thoughts.
‘There’s something incredibly real about her honesty. She doesn’t use anything as an excuse. She tells it like it is when she’s ready to. It’s why people – women in particular – love her so much.’
Having met and interviewed Adele, I cannot say I am surprised by her admission. This insanely talented BRIT School for Performing Arts and
Technology graduate has never played the game and always follows her own path – down to packing custard creams and spaghetti hoops in her bags and turning down offers of nights out with Kim Kardashian or Rihanna in favour of her old schoolmate, Laura Dockrill.
The first time I interviewed her, she showed up wearing no make-up, leggings and an old black baggy jumper, accessorised only by a pack of tobacco and her rolling papers. It was backstage at the BRIT Awards and even the roadies were in their Sunday best.
I asked her how it felt to be famous (she’d just released her album 19) and she replied, ‘A bit of a pain in the arse, to be honest. It’s a bit like being at school because you get told what to do all the time. I’ve been given a pair of Jimmy Choo shoes to wear but I’d rather wear my Converse.’
That attitude pretty much sums up Adele. Fame – when it came bigger and better, with bells on – didn’t impress her and it didn’t change her. Several years later, I met an La-based record executive who’d been stunned by Adele pulling out halfway through her first ever US tour because she was ‘missing her boyfriend’.
She told me then, ‘I’ve seen Beyoncé put on an incredible show the night her parents split up and she was in pieces. I’ve seen Céline Dion smiling and laughing on television when I happened to know she was going through some tough personal stuff. I’ve never known any artist, other than Adele, who puts her emotions and feelings before her career.’
But it is that absolute realness, that lack of showbiz gloss and veneer that makes Adele one of the true female heroes of our times.
Since her comments, she has been inundated with praise for her truthfulness and emotional bravery. She talked about how she recovered – without recourse to antidepressants – by listening to advice from her truly close friends and from her long-term partner, Simon Konecki.
‘I felt very inadequate; I felt like I’d made the worst decision of my life,’ she revealed. ‘Eventually, I just said, I’m going to give myself an afternoon a week, just to do whatever the f**k I want without my baby. A friend of mine said, “Really? Don’t you feel bad?” I said, “I do, but not as bad as I’d feel if I didn’t do it.”
‘I love my son more than anything but, on a daily basis, if I have a minute or two, I wish I could do whatever the f**k I want, whenever I want. Every single day I feel like that.’
One employee said, ‘Life is complicated and that’s what all of her music is about, because it comes from her real emotions. She tells it like it is. Good for her.’
ADELE TELLS IT LIKE IT IS. IT’S WHY PEOPLE LOVE HER SO MUCH