Ep. 251: Myles Smith | Stargazing, Therapy, and The Secret Cost of Success

How are you feeling with the pressure? Every day is a different day. I wake up some days and I catastrophize. I'm like, this is all going away tomorrow. And that's like a really real feeling and it scares me and I get super anxious. And then some days I wake up and I'm like, I'm exactly where I'm supposed to be. I never started my career for like critical mass. I started because I had something to say. It's crazy that this is only the beginning. Towards the end of COVID, I felt myself like really hitting rock bottom during it. When I was 18, it was probably the scariest time of my life because I, you know, tried to press control alt delete on life. And then I was like, I have to face my demons. This whole album is written on the notes from like my therapy throughout that time. How are you dealing with it now? Stargazing had come out. I quickly remember not long after it peaked, I had this massive empty feeling and it was like, how do I do that again? It's good that it happened fast. It's gotta be good, right? If I'm telling you the honest truth, it's, I feel not enough people talk about the scary side of having a hit. What would you say to 18 year old you now? This season is presented by NMPA, the National Music Publishers Association, champions of songwriters and publishers everywhere. Welcome to And The Writer Is, I'm your host, Ross Green. Today's rising star has risen to stardom and is not really a rising star anymore because he's currently a star you can stargaze at. He's proof that sometimes all you really need is a guitar, a work ethic, and a velvet voice. In a world where everybody's fighting to be louder, he's figured out a way to be heard. All the way from the United Kingdom, this artist surrounds himself with good people. So it's not surprising the music is good. And the writer is Miles Smith. That was the most creative intro I've ever had anywhere. Yeah. All right. Still batting, you know, 200 or something like that. The album is wrapped. Yes. It's been a lot of work. It's been a crazy amount of work to get here, but it feels good to like finally be done with it. Okay. So My Mess, My Heart, My Life, the track list is set. And you've been working on this album. Since we started hearing your music, it feels like, why is it so hard to put out albums? Yeah, no, it's real tough. Honestly, it was like a, a bit of a conversation around the album. Cause it like, for me, commercially, it would have made sense to like have stargazing and nice to meet you and then an album, but like I never started my career for like critical mass is what they call it when like people really want an album. Uh, I started it cause I had something to say and, uh, I've always done music before anyone cared. And so I wanted to take the time. Yeah. To get it right. Uh, I want to go back and tell your story a bit, but you're like, you're riding on this high right now. Cause like people, um, people don't usually have hits and then, uh, they really don't follow up hits with other hits. I, how are you feeling with the pressure of, of, you know, just the process of, of where it's at? It's really weird. There's like a lot of like. Pressure, but then there's a lot of like calm as well is like, is a real privilege to start my career in the way that I did and, you know, have like sort of now the freedom both creatively and professionally to sort of like do what I want and, and, you know, have that certain amount of like freedom in my label relationship and management relationship and, and what I do. But I guess then the pressure comes from the fact that people forget that I'm right at the start of the journey. And so there's this like huge expectation for whatever I do. To be like phenomenal and the best thing ever. But for me, it's like, I've never done an album before and I'm like still figuring stuff out. So it's like a really weird dichotomy where if you take away the hits, you could see where I really am as an artist. Um, and that's how I view it. But for a lot of people external to me, it's like, they're like, you must produce the best thing that we've heard ever. And I'm like, it's just not realistic. I'm still figuring this out. That's a, an amazing quote. And that idea that if you take away the hits, you know, who I really am as an artist is pretty brilliant. That might be true with all artists in some level. It's like, it's not always the, it's not always the hit that defines you. You know, it's the song that you like most that doesn't work that you're like this, you know, um, are you putting the pressure on you or do you feel it's more external? I wake up some days and I, I catastrophize and like, this is all going away. Tomorrow. And then some days I wake up and I've got a more level head and I'm like, I'm exactly where I'm supposed to be. Um, and I think I exist in a really weird generation of artists where like, we don't really prioritize albums that we used to, but we grew up on them. So it's like, I've grown up with like the history of like, I love albums, albums, what I consume, I love artists for their B sides and the record. And no one hears, and that's the norm, but I'm sort of growing in a market where it's like single, single, single, single. So it's like, my brain's telling me I want to do what I've always seen and loved, but I've got to do what right now requires. And it's like a really horrible spot to be in if I've been completely. Oh, interesting. Yeah. So that's, you know, heavy is the crown or whatever the saying is when you say you grew up on albums, what albums did you grow up on? What are your five albums? That you wore out? It's going to make me, this is going to show you how young I am. So like, for me, nostalgia is like green day, American idiot and 21st century breakdown and, you know, parachutes by, you know, cold play and, you know, barbel, Mumford and sons and electronic earth lab rim from, you know, the, the, the list goes on and is endless. And I won't do the typical thing where people name like five Bon Iver albums to see Mindy, like we all listen to them, but it doesn't define me, but you know, I listen to them. I listen to such a plethora of music and, um, yeah, just hearing things from real people is always what sort of like turned me on. Let's go from the beginning. You're, uh, you're, you were born, you were born. I was born. That was the start. Yeah. I think you do, man. Thanks, man. I feel pretty honored. Pretty fast. Every year that there's a birthday, you're like, all right, better than the alternative. Uh, okay. So wait, you were born in the UK. UK in London, right? Yeah, man. I made out the sack straight into Luton. Uh, that's where I was sort of born and raised. It's like a really small town near to London. So it was like London's close enough. You could like, look at it and be like, wow, London. And if anyone asks you, you say you're from London, but far enough away that you're still broke. So it's like a, a really cool spot because you have no money, but you have all of the friendship and culture in the world. So what did your parents do? Uh, so my mom worked in like, sort of like schools. And then as she got older, moved into like consultancy and stuff. And my dad, I'm not really sure. I never really had a relationship with him when I was like off conscious age. So. Yeah. Yeah. What about siblings, siblings, uh, brothers in like, sort of like management and consultancy and then my sister, the same. So very like professional nine to five worker family. So your mom took care of all those kids solo. Yeah. How I still don't know the answer to that to this day as she did it so well, you know? Like there's a big age gap between me and the oldest. So, you know, I'm 27, he's 36 now. Uh, so like, yeah, she had, uh, all three of us and she managed to look after us, give us all like equal attention and all sort of like went on to do great things in life. So she's like a super woman in the midst of like a crazy divorce and like, you know, hard financial times and stuff. I generally don't know how she did it. Who introduced you to the idea of actually singing or actually playing? Uh, yeah, I started singing sort of like, I used to go to church with my grandma growing up. So like during like the separation of my parents, like my grandma's like house became like sort of like a place that I'd be most days of the week because they were figuring their shit out. And so like my grandma was like hardcore religious, you know, like amen before every meal, like you'd be like starving at the dinner table. I just want to eat. And she's like, here's a five minute prayer we're going to say, and he's just like, look at me. Looking at the bowl, sweating, like now I'm fucking hungry, bro. Uh, but she was like religious as hell. And she took us to church every Sunday and it was only during church or like got into like singing and you don't really know if you're good or not. You just sort of feel it and you're in the emotion of it. And you know, it's, it's not about being technical or no music. You just sort of do it. And, uh, eventually you do it for so long that when you start singing outside of church and people start going, oh, you're okay. And stuff you. Oh, I can sing. How old are you when you were, when, when, when is this window? Probably like six till like nine is when I started like singing in church and then, you know, go from church, like school assemblies and choirs and stuff. And used to do that. Are you religious? Uh, I was growing up. I think at this age, I'm sort of like anyone that that is my age, I've got so many questions and so many things that like, you know, happened in my. life that it sort of like makes me doubt a lot of things. but i think at my core i still am and i'm super like spiritual and that i still believe in something and i live and lead my life like super morally and most of like the way i live life is still religiously music in churches really it really changes depending which church you're in and uh i'm always envious because the music i grew up with in a religious setting was mostly minor keys and just not like you know you don't hear a lot of people being like oh my god i learned it really well at synagogue like that's not like that's not really how that but when i think of like a church like the music can range from being bach to being you know uh you know who's big right now forrest is big right now like church music could be all kinds of things what kind of church music did you grow up with like i grew up black as fuck as well so like we had rhythm and rhyme and soul so you know uh all of like the church music we listened to was like all sort of like major keys and like use a bunch of fifths and like everything just felt like coming of age if that makes sense and so it was good feelings and um i think a lot of that translates my music now and like harmonies and the way that songs move and you know landing on hope and all of those sorts of things so like yeah church for me from early doors was like felt yeah it it also it's just i mean it just makes often these really big melodies because you're and really memorable choruses because you know people have to sing along to stuff and they're i'm just jealous um so you leave you know when you're saying it's when you're singing out of church when people are like hey you're pretty good yeah you're only nine years old at that point you're doing things like you're singing in school doing like like what so i used to do like little school talent shows and i used to love going there and doing that stuff what song did you sing your first talent show my first talent show oh it was probably like fix you by coldplay uh and then not long after when i got into like senior school which is like 11 years old in the uk like it was i remember specifically billionaire by bruno mars yeah and that shit went off yeah oh i'm sure yeah yeah yeah uh that song is still great shout out phil um so you're going you're doing these songs when did you start thinking you could write uh writing came pretty naturally actually so um i got to about 10 years old i want to say and i tried like sports so like football basketball rugby and i was like terrible at like the lot and then it was like swimming and then i was like wait i'm black so that didn't work um and then a bunch of other stuff and and i just kept getting to this point where i do it for a few weeks it didn't work and i'm not going to do it like and so my mum just pushed me towards like hey like well you love singing so like how about you know you try an instrument so i picked the guitar and we didn't have much money at the time but i remember going down and i think it was called like a famas or something it was like in dollars it was like 50 guitar and uh it was like nylon string classical because at that time i didn't know the difference between a steel string and a nylon i was like this fretboard's huge but yeah i'll go with it um and when i started playing guitar what i used to do is i used to like go on youtube and like learn like covers but then just replace the covers with my own words and that's like how i started songwriting so not really understanding like you know the difference between lyric and melody and just being like mum i wrote a song like in the exact same melody as a hit song um but i did that and then naturally i just then took the chords and wrote my own melodies and etc and etc and it grew and it grew and it grew yeah that's really interesting because there are a lot of professional songwriters where they've made a living is is taking existing melodies and rewriting lyrics around them so um you're you're already training for this job what was the first song that you wrote where you were you uh we actually played it for your mom that you remember yeah that was a song i wrote called dream girl how does it go uh um it was um oh man there's a guitar right there how did that get there is it in tune play the first song yeah it was i remember second verse some reason but it was like it was half night winter night and it felt cold it didn't feel right so i text again just to say i need you in my life every day oh oh oh you are my dream girl yeah there you go how old are you 10 why does it come so naturally i don't know i think i've always listened to big hook music you know it's like um even even in the b-sides that i love they always had like great hooks like and and one of my earliest sort of like things i latched onto was a album by labyrinth called electronic earth yeah yeah it's amazing i'm still to now it baffles me how that record wasn't even bigger than it than it was but with that it was like i grew up in luton like as a young black kid and at that time it was like my role models and examples were like rap trap hip-hop drill and like when labyrinth came around in the uk it was like one of the first examples of a guy who looks like me and sounded like me making pop and it like blew my mind and i went to go see him like live a little pop-up thing that my mom took me to and i was like he plays guitar and i was like oh my god he's got a guitar as well i was like mom black people play guitars i was like what and then she schooled me not long after um and yeah listening to that album and you know there were songs like you know vultures and treatment and you know sweet riot and every single song is just like you hear it once and you remember all of it and i think that came out super close to when i started songwriting uh and i think that's why i've always prioritized songs that like you can remember them after you listen because it just does something for me do you feel pressure do you feel pressure to do music that people expect a black person to make uh in like a stereotypical way no i've always liked doing the opposite actually that's always done something for me and uh i think it's really difficult because it's you sort of grow up and you see examples and you're like oh that's what black people make that's what white people make and then you do a like you get older and you start to do more and you start to do more and you start to do more and you start to learn about the history of music where it comes from you're like well all of this is just bullshit anyway um and so now it's like i just try to place myself in feelings and emotions and whatever genre that may be or sound that may be or sonic is like where i find myself living um and i chase a feeling rather than you know all of the other bits around it okay so let's get to the you know you you start playing some of these songs you know at 10 years old you're playing that for like just your mom or are you playing some of these songs for your mom playing this as a school do you ever play this at the talent show yeah i played i played actually in a like class assembly which like all the kids in the school in like one hall and like i played it because the teachers are like oh you're really good you should play like with the girl that i wrote it for in the assembly and it was like the most embarrassing thing in retrospect and it didn't work um did you say this is for you uh i was looking at her during it and like it definitely was not the move and at 10 years old i had no place to be staring someone in the eye singing you are my dream girl yeah but well now it'd be weird for the record at 10 to do that to another 10 year old that makes a little more sense now i'd be like yeah yeah um that's uh but that's so ballsy and it's so good like i bet that that that now woman is like holy shit he wrote a song for me when i was 10 probably yeah i've never actually thought about that yeah well that's we spread we could probably connect some dots this is incredible now i remember that when was the idea of i maybe this is what i want to be when i grow up um i think that idea came like sort of when i started to do open mics and stuff like that so i got to about 11 12 years old and there used to be like sort of like daytime open mics and and evening ones mom used to like drive me all around like our local town and you know take me to them because she knew that i really loved doing it and so i was playing like eight or nine open nights like open mics a week in all the neighboring towns and back home and like we'd go after school and she'd take me and like we'd go on the weekends and she'd take me and then eventually i bumped into my now guitarist joe who also used to run those circuits and he was like a few years older than me so he was like 16 so i and it she like eventually let me start going with him because like we'd been in the same place so many times and like he used to like make agreements with like the bar owners and the pub owners like hey like he's not old enough to get in but like we come in through the back door he plays a few songs and get out can we do that and so we'd start doing that and i think i used to just love like the three or four people who would like really enjoy the music and be like this feels like you know electric and uh the more i did it the more i was like holy snap like imagine doing this as a living and that's where that seed was planted open mics are where a lot of singer-songwriters come in come up it's it's honestly super fun sometimes you show up to open mic and you wouldn't even get to go on stage sometimes you'd go you get your three songs in and you know if you're any good that people they're like what are you doing here you know and and you get your get your reps and kind of like how comedian does with their open mics 100 and now a lot of people are don't really have that opportunity because they're told that they should memorialize this growth moment and on the internet and they don't get the opportunity to fail a million times over you know it's not as uh you know explain why open mics are so important for singer songwriters on the come up i think it's one of the most important steps in a journey and it really scares me like for the artists who are going through it who go straight from like i don't know tiktok or instagram to playing to two three hundred cap venues because yeah that's really cool but there's so much that you learn just from being in a room with like someone who's miserable drinking a guinness and like having to convince them you're the next star with like a half-broken voice like there's something about you know having a bad night or having a really good night that just teaches you like in the live space like crowd work you know and how to like you know move a crowd and how to like add peaks and dips to your set and you know how to really build a live performance like a show but then in the music side open mics are great for like you write a little song on your guitar at home and you could take it out on the road and you could like test if it's a good song or not and have fun with it that way and even be confident to present your music and not everything feeling like life and death because i feel like and you know even i'm subject to it now you know as an artist it's there's no real scope for failure that exists anymore and it's really a scary place that you could have something amazing and then you do what is a natural course of being a writer and put out something that's okay or average or not good and suddenly the world shifts and that's a really weird thing that we've like almost like engineered an environment where failure can't exist or people are scared to fail and i was really lucky that i got to fail a thousand times before i ever played my first show yeah that's amazing when do you play your first set where you're sort of the headliner oh it was even if it's at a coffee shop yeah no it was a definitely manufactured it was like a 100 capacity venue uh in a small town called st auburn's and like 90 out of the 100 people were friends and family that i convinced to pay a lot of money and it was my headline yeah yeah um but they loved it yeah they loved it and you know it was uh it was me and i was in like a really like shitty indie band at the time what was the band called it was called bear with a three okay uh yeah and uh we we played and it was like one of the most exhilarating things ever and it was just super awesome to see it all come together and at that time you know like in the way that music used to be when i grew up it was like your local band playing together and i was like oh my god i'm gonna play a lot of music and i'm gonna listen to a hundred people like that's your north star of where you want to go like that is a successful career you know and it's like all of these famous people seem like they're in another world and it's like i used to think if i could make it to that 100 cap venue i've made it you know and that was such a amazing and tangible feeling to chase um and yeah that was my first sort of like gig experience all the people you said when when i said what albums do you like you you named you know coldplay and mumford and son and green day and and all these bands and here you are in a you know then you were in a in a band during you know what you say bear yeah yeah you know it's like another band you know uh why aren't you in a band i feel like i'm selfish uh in a way that music is so personal to me that i quickly realized i love all the parts of a band like playing live together and you know creating a band together and you know going out on the road and having fun parts and bits your day but when it comes to the studio like and writing music i i hated the feeling of i had to share this like i had to open up like if i wanted to say something it it was a communal discussion uh and i felt really quickly like i can't feel fulfilled making music that way where i have to uh maybe not even choice like a revelation or you know maybe i belong being different you know especially when you're sort of north stars are bands yeah uh what at what age did you say okay i'm gonna start releasing my own stuff sorry guys i'm gonna like this is actually me yeah i did for a period between like 18 and like 20 like release my own stuff and it was like not the music i make now but i did for a period between like 18 and like 20 like release my own stuff and it was like me figuring it out like what was it like oh dude like i said i was i was i grew up in luton so i was like making like melodic rap and trap and hip-hop and stuff like i could spit like you know what's a what's a song that you did at that time they were like this is a hit but it wasn't a hit from like one that i heard or one that i wrote myself that you wrote yourself oh i had a song called scars which i really loved how did that go uh it was melodic it was like uh and then i know can you turn the lights on now i would need to like get it up somewhere remember it yeah it was sick i remember it um is that stuff still available no that was cleansed just like my linkedin that's gone i didn't exist before 2023 it's like you're like jason bourne or something yeah yeah yeah who said you had to cleanse all that stuff was that you that was me yeah i felt like it was a really cool chapter in my life to experiment with just like putting out music and things like that but there was also the part of me and i do this quite a lot in life it wasn't reflecting who i was i thought it was really cool um but as this is music i was like it's not really what i want to say or who i stand for as a person it just sounds really cool um and i think it's a really cool thing to do and i think it's a really when i came back to it again when i was like 24 i really had something to say and i think that was always my biggest blocker as a musician like i went from like 11 to 16 writing really intimate songs that sound a lot like what i do now um and then i hit like 17 and you know you go to like university and you start you know reinventing yourself and stuff and i was making music for that period of my life and then you grow up and realize what am i doing and that's when i started my career yeah i moved out here and uh and i was the songs were super intimate you know it was there was a vibe it was it was very specific to what i ended up sounding like much you know later but i ended up going to school here and there were some bands out of my school that became really famous and i was like i want to sound like them and i totally ended up like changing and i remember i met a producer when i first moved out here who had done counting crows and some of these big bands in the 90s and it was like you know he wanted to work with me was introducing to me and then i was like well yeah but what if i sounded like this and he's like yeah i'm not feeling it i was like no all the cool bands are doing this yeah and then i spent years like kind of scratching like a ceiling where i was like pretty close and it wasn't until i was when i was like i'm gonna just do my own thing yeah when i started sounding like me again and that's when i got my first record deal yeah it's like a weird uh vulnerability that i feel like artists need to if they're really authentic to themselves that's your fingerprint hundred percent and you sink or swim with that yeah and not everybody's made to be successful at it it's not like i sold a shitload of records as an artist you know but like not everybody's made to be successful but if they're at least authentic to themselves they won't be like anybody else a million percent and i think what was confusing about that stage and why i and sonics is like i was like heavily listening to like like black like six lack and you know bryson tiller and saint john like they were like filling my brain and i was like i love how their music makes me feel but i think back then i was failing to decipher how it made me feel and what they were and i think i was trying to be them but what i was really trying to doing is emulate the feeling that the music gave me and i think that i've been able to do that with music now and like be like oh i just love music and i've been able to do that with music now and like be like oh i just love how that makes me feel not necessarily i need to make that sound how much did covid and that life you know everything gets shut down and this is really where you're going through that self discovery as a musician how did finding yourself as a musician as a musician and as an artist how was that affected by the isolation of covid covid for me was a really stressful one because i not long broke up with my girlfriend at the time uh i was like you know on the other side of the country from my family and i was like living alone for all of it so i had a lot of time and i at that time like an idiot thought TikTok was just a dancing app so I didn't even engage with it during COVID like my whole TikTok journey started after that so I pissed away COVID pretty much on Zoom like when my friends playing drinking games closing my laptop and just being in my room like I'm really alone right now and you know a lot of sort of like when you have that much time to think so much trauma was coming back so much like family issues were coming back and I was like in a really really bad place during all of it and so I just like pissed away my days playing Fortnite because I was like I don't want to think about any of this stuff and sort of towards the end of COVID I sort of started virtual counseling and therapy and I think it was like the best thing I ever did because I felt myself like really hitting rock bottom during it and COVID became like this really cathartic experience where I was like tried to drink it away then I tried to like play games and distract myself then I tried to do the thing where like you get fit during COVID I went on like one run and I was like I'm not getting fit. And then I was like fuck it I have to face my demons and yeah started therapy during COVID and you know not having the pressure of like you know talking about stuff at home when your mum's there about this stuff that you know happened when you were a child was like oh I could talk about this freely and you know not having a girlfriend around so you could talk about like how your relationship is impacting you and you could speak freely it just allowed me to have a really direct conversation with my counselor like pretty much like every other day which was awesome. When you say you were across the country from your family where were you? I was in Nottingham so I don't know if many people know the UK well but like London's right at the bottom and then Nottingham's right in the middle. Why were you there? So I was going to school up there and then I got a job up there after so yeah the year I left school was COVID. And dealing with your demons or you know the trauma why hadn't you been able to deal with it before? I think I've always been. I've always been like high functioning so like I get really like I have to fill my time and I'm really good at doing it and as soon as things go quiet I'll find something else to like fill my time and this was a one time in my life I wasn't able to fill it with anything because the world had closed down and then it all hit me like like a wave. A lot better. I think you know between COVID and you know the start of my like career taking off was like I spent a lot of time in therapy and like working through things and I was able to unpack a lot and to work through a lot and you know it's not album promo even though I probably should be like oh my god listen to the album but you know this whole album's written on the notes from like my therapy throughout that time and like it really helped me understand who I was and where I was and where I was going. You know my flaws were as a human being and what I could do to improve it and yeah that period was really amazing. What were your flaws? Man I still got loads but like my main flaws like you know I had crazy trust issues you know like that sort of like you know stemmed from a whole bunch of stuff like insecurities and and my anxiety was like terrible like I got to the point I'd go out in public and I'd like just be shaking like like violently because like the idea of people like looking at me and then thinking people are thinking things about me and like it stopped me from going outside quite a bit and like depression got really bad like when I was 18 was probably the scariest time of my life because you know I you know tried to press control alt delete on life to you know say in the easiest way and that was the first time I went therapy and then I went you know to an emergency therapist and you know you do like six weeks with them just so that you don't like finish you know complete the game and you know but I didn't really deal with anything I just learned how not to be that bad so when I got to this batch of therapy and I learned about my flaws you know the trust issues the insecurities the anxieties uh you know the the my my flippantness and like my switch to being like really hot and cold with everyone all the time and not letting people in and taking on too much like I was just a huge list of stuff and it all stemmed back to like things I just hadn't dealt with how incredible to go from not wanting to go in public because of being afraid of you know having anxiety around how people perceive you potentially to then having hits and performing in front of thousands and thousands of people and it was just it was a huge deal for me to be able to do that and I think I learned a lot from that and I think I learned a lot and I think I learned a lot from it and I think I learned a lot from it and I think I learned a lot from it and I think I learned a lot from it and I think I learned a lot from it and I think I learned a lot from it and I think I learned a lot from it and I think I learned a lot from it and I think I learned a lot from it and I think I learned a lot from it and I think I learned a lot from it and I think I learned a lot from it and I think I learned a lot from it and I think I learned a lot from it and I think I learned a lot from it and I think I learned a lot from it but speaking to 18 year old me now it'd probably just be like I know you're doing a good job you know and like life's tough and it's hard and you know there's things that are really tough and complicated and things do get worse before they get better and you know SSRIs take a while to adjust to but you'll get through it mm-hmm when you said your notes in those therapy sessions are the basis of this album mm-hmm what was the first song you wrote during that phase where you're like oh this is getting me out of this because it presumably it's the music that that helped you move forward yeah what's the first song they were like this feels different the first song on the album or pre the album I don't know I mean during that phase wherever if it's on the album or not but there's a moment you know when that therapy's sort of unlocking the door and then walking through it is is seems to be this next phase of your music career so what what was it like walking through the door walking through the door was like a really strange thing I think there was still a lot of character traits of like you know being overly busy and like you know rushing through life and not being in the moment that you know stuck around for a while but genuinely I think the moment I fell back in love with music like probably like properly was like when I remember I had a conversation with my friend Naya uh who's like a really good friend and um I was starting to like write music in my room again and stuff like this and he was starting like a little like sort of like production company sort thing and he was like ah like we should do a music video together I was like oh what for like one of my songs and he was like yeah like why not he was like I'm trying to do stuff you're trying to do stuff let's do it and like we did a couple and it was like really fun and it felt really good and it was just like he always was telling me like dude like you should like really do this thing for real like and I always used to be like pushing it off because like you don't want to face a disappointment um and he just coached me and coached me to just keep going and going and going and then one day he goes you should try tiktok and uh I was like I'm not trying that shit he was like no you should seriously I was like I'm not getting up in the morning just doing all that stuff I was like that's not me all that all that bullshit and he was like dude no just put your music on there and see what happens and yeah I saw what happened and yeah it felt really good to like have ownership back of like this is my thing I'm gonna do it and it's not for people it's for myself and then people fell in love with it and it was just like really nice to just be like I'm just doing this because I enjoy doing this yeah I mean you choose to do by the way I love the dance move I now feel like I know we're gonna do the hour after this interview and I and I hope that we uh you know we got a lot of songs to choose from with the album we should definitely but this is gonna happen okay so you but you do you know the cover of sweater weather feels like that's like the first time you know that that's like a like a really viral moment yeah um shout out jesse just been on this podcast tell me about that moment where it's like oh these numbers are not are no longer a hundred people in a room yeah that when I first posted sweater weather that it just like took off like a rocket um and that's like the first instance of I was like oh tiktok isn't just like a thousand people and 500 of which are from loot and sing good job I was like this is really a thing around the world and uh I was just like okay let me just check it wasn't for luck so I did it again I was like oh it's happened twice uh and I did it again and again and again and again like eight times to the point it was like I'd grown like a hundred thousand followers off like 30 seconds of this one song and I was like this is absolutely nuts and then I was like let me try my own song did nothing and I was like okay which was the song at that point is that memories or is that that's later that comes just a little bit after so what's the first song that you you're like huh they're not really reacting to the it was just something at home yeah yeah just something at home didn't really react and then I did memories uh which was a track that I saw like it was my first ever single and it was just a song that I loved you do that with adam yeah how did you get in the room with that guy yeah I mean is it from 10 that people are starting to say like yeah i'll write with this guy yeah no so what had happened is that when all of these covers and things were starting to take off my management uh the current management eric parker had like reached out and he'd be like dude you're really cool i want to help you like make your own stuff basically um and so what had happened is that i'd done like a bunch of like co-writes that he had sort of like set up and then i worked with adam and adam was like super awesome and we did the session out in his garden and it just felt really cool and really right and i still feel like it was too early to like really know what i wanted to sound like and who i wanted to be but i think i just wanted to put something out because i didn't want to be classified as like a tiktok cover kid like i was uh it was something i was really like conscious on my mind that i don't want to just be known as i could sing someone else's song really good because i've been writing songs at this point you like you know 12 13 years um and so i wanted to put something out and the schedule of it coming out was dictated by the fact that i blagged my way onto a support tour at the time so there was a band called amber run who like i absolutely loved and like they'd obviously seen that i was doing something on tiktok and i was like yeah dude like i've got loads of songs let me come on tour with you i hadn't had one recorded at this point uh so like i was like working backwards in order to try and like get to a place where i could go on tour with them like three months from when i did that it's weird when you have a deadline i i see people make the mistake of i've got this one show so i want to have the album done by you know july 1st and so i'm gonna i will finish this album whether it's good or not by this time but that said having a deadline gets somebody really working you know are you then writing a lot of new music or are you more trying to record stuff that you had already written a bit of both a bit of both writing a bunch of new music but also recording stuff that i'd written before and you know most these tracks like never came out that i told them but they they hadn't come out and i think it's because again a bit like where i landed after stargazer and nice to meet you and a bit like where i landed after having like my indie sort of band and like my sort of like melodic rap period is like i didn't want to have a footprint of something that wasn't completely me and what i wanted to say and so i always have like that conversation with myself in my mind like before i do something is this what i really want it to be um and i remember having like a project ready to go and i was like i don't know if that's how i want to introduce myself to my audience and so it never came out that's a lot of uh self-awareness was anyone telling you you don't sound like that you shouldn't do that or is it all just in your head all in my head yeah that's wild that's really that's hard to do it's not this is not what i want to do you know when i look at the streaming numbers for something memories and you know you're talking about like across platforms 30 million plus streams like 30 million plus streams yeah sure how about that well that's what i was gonna ask like i can't i can't tell it doesn't say like hey this is the chart of this is the growth chart of this song yeah but you know i know a lot of artists that don't have songs that have that many streams across platforms or when that song comes out i guess it didn't if that's surprising to you that means it didn't come out like out of the box with lots of streams oh no my home comes out pretty close after that and that's like crazy numbers yeah yeah nmpa is our lead sponsor yet again what is the national music publishers association what do publishers have to do with songwriters anyway well unlike artists who can be unsigned artists there is no such thing as a songwriter there is no such thing as an unsigned writer you can be a self-published a co-publisher a published writer publishers only make money if songwriters make money so nmpa goes and fights for you they go to congress they go and support the community they fight dsps to get you paid more that's what they do they fight for you and they fight for this podcast so thank you for fighting for songwriters nmpa thank you for fighting for us too uh give me the process because that's like a you know that's a hit yeah oh you know appreciate how does that like how does it go from okay i've done covers i released a song you know i'm in the thing i've gotten out management yeah you know things are the team's coming together how do you have your first hit honestly and i i hate to say it i think the day i met peter fenn was the day that my career started and i've got to give that man so much credit that's like my brother but he changed my entire perspective on music and had i've not met him i don't think i'd be where i am first of all shout out peter fenn good man he's been a he's a friend of the podcast and obviously very talented how do you meet peter fenn uh so me and pete meet so not long after so i go to the u.s for the my very first time for six weeks like straight after the memory straight off the memory of peter fenn i go to the u.s for the very first time for six weeks like straight after the memories came out so i was in the u.s six weeks i did three weeks in nashville three weeks in la and i worked with everyone at this point who you signed who you signed to uh not signed at this point so who's who's fronting this who's scheduling this yeah my management he he was in the trenches yeah yeah yeah yeah he got his money back but yeah no but good on him i mean that's it that's an actual investment like it's it's both you know sweat equity and equity equity so you're you spend three weeks in nashville three weeks in la you said you wrote with everybody but not me that's cool i'll let it go um so you go you write with a bunch of people nashville's got a lot of right good writers la's got a lot of good writers what is it about peter so pete was my very last session at the end of that six weeks and my manager used to manage pete uh pre pete being a writer producer uh so when pete had an artist project which uh i hope you guys go and search um so when pete did that uh him and eric parted ways um and eric was always like you should work with pete you should work with pete so the last two days he's like let's do it and i'm like absolutely knackered at this point like you know it's like it's been a great trip and it's been fun and exciting but i'm missing home it's like i wanted to go home a bit earlier but i was like we'll do this pete session so anyway go and meet pete and you guys know pete but for people who don't know pete he is like a character like big energy guy he's like he's like a big energy guy he's like a big heart like warm as hell like just fun you know and uh i was like wait music writing with other people is supposed to be fun because i'd like respectfully like up until that point it felt very like nashville very like song focused very methodical and and and mathsy in terms of like you know we have this we land the punchline here we go here we go here i was like that didn't suit me it's like then you come to la and it's like i don't know i don't know i don't know i don't every session starts with like we're gonna write a smash and then you don't and then you just feel like dejected and it's like three weeks in a row of going we're gonna write a smash and you leave with like a b-side that the producer's not going to get back to you because they're just like it's not worth my time and i'm an up-and-coming artist at this point so it's like yeah we'll get the bounce back so i've got like an mp3 where my vocals are bounced slightly out of time and it's just like okay this isn't gonna work but when i was in with pete i remember coming with like this let's just have fun like i was like oh so we're not going to sit here and talk about for two hours why the industry's failing and then use all of that energy that we've mustered from negative energy to write a great song i was like wow who knew it could be this easy um and yeah we we just chatted we hung like we're we're mates and like then a song came naturally from that process and it was just like such a weird way but looking back such an obvious way to make music is like fun get to know each other if you make a song great if you don't hey it's like building blocks on the next session and i think that pete always had pushed me to like prioritize enjoying what i'm doing um and if i'm not enjoying it don't do it um and i carry that into like every session that i do now and then the second thing is like don't chase what other people are doing is like what are you gonna do that makes people want to listen and that could only come from you and i think that's what i'm doing and i think that's what i'm doing and i think that's what he's really good especially with artists who are like up and coming to like his great at helping them establish their voice not someone else's voice um and he definitely did that for me because i felt how i went home with such a clearer identity of who i was and what i wanted to say so my home was written during those two also is that first day we met each other first hour of meeting each other we wrote that song you wrote this on an hour yeah first first hour of meeting each other shame on you do you have the voice note of that it would take me a while to dig up but i could find it probably it's the first song that has like meaningful international success going from your hometown that has you know you were saying a hundred feels like it's something 500 feels like something yeah having a song that has tens of millions and now hundreds of millions of streams and having like this like visible international success i guess it's not necessarily visible because it's statistical at this point but what did it feel like to communicate internationally from where you started it was a strange feeling for sure it was like i remember i'd like at the very start of it like i used to have this app that used to tell me like what new music fridays or playlists had been added on and i remember getting added on like like spotlight number 56 on like new music friday argentina and i'm like yo people from argentina know who i am like that's crazy and like you know or going on instagram and it'd be like i don't know like a z-lister like german influencer like reposting music like people in people speak german know me it's like that feeling was crazy and like probably something to highlight that never taken that feeling for granted because i remember how important that was to like me believing in myself that you know random people like even like seeing like a woman drive a car in like the netherlands with her son singing in the background like on a posted story like those small things really made me believe oh this is really possible and really achievable and really cool um and dealing with it it wasn't really dealing with it it was about enjoying it and i really enjoyed it and it was like such a affirmation after like what 14 years at that point of like you know making music that oh this thing could do something yeah just coming where you came from unless like yeah all that preparation but a pretty dark spot right before it to to go from that to oh i am being heard yeah so i mean you know what the hero's journey is no the hero's journey is uh you know it's basically like star wars is the hero's journey there are a lot of versions of this you'll start recognizing it and a lot of things if you don't know it but essentially you have the hero starts off with you know uh just exists somebody says hey you can do this like i don't know if i should do this they leave home they they go on this journey and uh you know they meet different sort of yoda characters along the way they're like well why don't you try it like this and you could do that and and and and you know then you get into all the the darkness or you you have to battle all kinds of things and somebody else comes so this is how you battle that and this i and by the time you come home you're you're a different person and you're a different person and you're a different person who's able to say this is the this is the journey i went on and i i botched that there's an easier way to say it but the point of the hero's journey is very much a lot like your your career it's like you start off by being you know your mom's the first yoda like hey i'm gonna take you're good at this let me take you to these open mics you know you can do this and then to be like okay now your family's part of the thing and then you you go through all these dark moments of you know that you think that the down part is i'm gonna do you know is is when you're 18 then you hit another down when you're 21 or 22 and you're like you know those are that's all part of the hero's journey to then have a moment where you're looking up you're like oh my god there's somebody in the netherlands somebody in argentina and like oh i i think i understand this and then you know you come back literally to have a song called my home and it really completes the hero's journey and that and i feel like where we're at now is the sequels you know it's like you know it's like you know it's like you know it's like when when you're getting into that you follow it up with solo that's a pretty like if in the beginning you said if you know stargazing and you know nice to meet you are not that's where your career is if those two songs were the first two songs you'd be pretty stoked with that too oh yeah you know what i mean those are kind of massive for that there are a lot of people who don't have that did you start feeling like you would in a way at that point did you feel like you had made it were your expectations met at that point to an extent yeah i think having my home and solo uh was really really good because this was all pre-label as well so it was nice of grown so organically and like at the time it was literally just me and eric my manager that was the team there was no one else you know and pete like you know he mixed and you know produced the whole thing there was like it just went to master so the team was small it was me pete and eric basically making this thing all work and um having those two really affirmed like oh like we're moving in the right direction and this feels really good i think what they did is affirm where i was but also showed me oh this could get so much bigger as well which was like also really cool and i think one of the dangers as an artist as well is that you always i guess cast a huge shadow over what you're doing with the music and the music itself and i think that's really cool and i think that's really cool the question of what's next um and i think after stargazing i've learned and we'll get there i'm sure i've learned that question is the worst question to ever ask yourself and sometimes just say enjoy now where did you we can jump to that for a second after stargazing you had moments where you were questioning you i guess you weren't questioning you were you were stuck in the future i was definitely stuck in the future and i think you know even so stargazing had come out and it was like i think it was like three million streams the first day or whatever it was and it was like super funny and exciting and like celebrated with my band you know i was on the road at the time and had festivals around the corner and it was like an amazing experience and then you know it grew and it grew and it was i think it peaked at like five million plays a day or whatever it was and it was this amazing thing and i quickly remember not long after it peaked i had this massive empty feeling and it was like huh like what's next and how do i do that again and the prospect was so daunting because up until stargazing my career was like on a steady trajectory up and then it did that and i was like i've missed so many steps that i'm like how how can i bring now factor in the fact that i've missed the steps i really wanted to take because i'm not ready for that yet and you almost have to like work backwards to be ready for it and i think in my career in a whole it was the biggest blessing and curse because like i loved it and i love what it's done and i love the fact that you know i'm able to do arenas now and you know tour the world which is like such a phenomenal feat but i also feel like it's pushed me and sped me part apart of my career where i get to learn and develop out of sight out of mind um and it's a really weird feeling to live with but some people have that hit on their first song and they don't have there's nothing in the past for their audience to go look at yeah they didn't have my home they didn't have solo they didn't have anything to look at so they go and they hit that and then they the label's also like well what do you have next you you have to have something next yeah and you're stuck in the middle that's how one hit wonders happen all the time you know it's like everyone's chasing like this hit before they have any foundation you had the foundation of open mics all the way up so when you put throw you on a stage you're like you can adjust it's just more people yeah yeah you know it's a lot more people but it's still it's still a stage yeah it's still microphone still guitar it's still the band you know some of that stuff you had a foundation it's good that it happened fast yeah scary as shit but it's got to be good right yeah i think that's uh respectfully like the pr answer that it's got to feel amazing but if i'm telling you the honest truth it's daunting as hell um and i feel not enough people talk about the scary side of having a hit because no one preps you from going like oh i'm at home and i get to see my family and my friends and i get to do this really cool music career to within the space of three months being like oh by the way mom i'm not really going to be able to see you much in the next six months even though we speak and talk every day um and by the way best friend i'm going to miss your wedding um and by the way family i'm going to miss like three funerals like it's a really weird weird space to be in and as a person i've never chased faint that has never been something like that has been part of my active suit i've always just wanted it to be about music making music and people respecting me for my music so there was a naivety i think getting into this career that naturally other elements of my life would change you know and that's been a struggle i think having a hit and going global is phenomenal and is amazing but then being global also means like hey there's a lot of countries who aren't as progressive and liberal as the place that i'm from and racism hits you in a way in which you don't learn how to deal with that has been really weird learning how to communicate who i am to so many different people whilst having to hold on to parts of myself just to feel sane has been such a weird experience and i think through all of it there's there was no learning like curve it was like you're here now deal with it um and that's on no one else's fault because none of us anticipated it for it to come that quickly and there's been a lot of work since then to sort of like catch up with it but i a human being, it's been one of the most most exciting and brutal parts of my life and um i'm only now enjoying it again but i think i was smiling through a lot of last year like and the last two years you know i was like you know i had to go get my brain scanned because my brain started doing weird stuff because i was sleep deprived and burnt out like i i did a trip where i went from like i played a show in new zealand next day i landed in la and did the voice next day i landed in the uk and did big weekend and you have to smile through all of it you know and it's like i think learning balance has been difficult and i just i wouldn't want to sit on this podcast and do myself like an injustice and be like having a hit and being big is amazing it comes with a lot of complications and you've got to be ready for it and i wish more artists spoke openly about the reality of it because then there's no like there's no blindfold to you walking into it yeah we talked to some writers about you know you have that number one song and there's no ticker tape parade for a writer nobody even knows who you are and you finally hit this number one you're like i got it and you're still on your phone you're still at home you're still like you still have to do laundry you still have to do the things like it's not all it's cracked up to be but as an artist it's it's almost the opposite where it's like you don't even have the it's not routine like the problem for i think a lot of writers is that the routine stays generally the same yeah you know but they're you're expecting a lot of this like ring you know something crazy and you know a championship ring or something like that and it's like it doesn't happen like that and as a as an artist it's almost the exact opposite it's like whatever routine you thought you had now we're gonna go and be in new zealand la and and you can you are gonna miss these funerals and you are gonna miss you know your family as your family have your friends been understanding yes but it's been difficult to get there you know i feel my mom has been the hardest relationship because i've struggled to she's like my best friend man she's been there my whole life you know she's been the person that has kept me sane throughout my whole life and you know walked me through it and then you know hitting periods where i didn't see her for like three four five months at a time became really difficult um and then there's uh the you know the i guess mechanical part of the relationship which is like she was like my caregiver and my mom and i've been there my whole life you know she's been the person that has kept me sane throughout my whole life and you know walked me through it and then you know hitting periods where i didn't see her for like three four five months at a time became really difficult um and then there's uh the you know the i guess mechanical part of the relationship which is like she was like my caregiver and person who's supporting me and now it's like hey mom i want to retire you and that's the whole conversation because like she's like doesn't know what to do or say or feel and like i've walked into that situation like i'm gonna retire you and she's walked to that situation like i don't know if i need that or want that right now in my life and then me thinking i've done all of this to be in that position to create that and this isn't the response that i thought i would get um and so there's so many different emotional imbalances having an older brother and now being in a financial position where i'm i guess more capable to be an older brother um but then still not wanting to undermine him but then him still wanted to be protective over me not necessarily understand my industry but then me also wanted to be able to give back to him and it's there's so many parts of relationships and all of your relationships that make no sense and then it's suddenly the questions that you have like all of my band and crew are i'm really lucky have been friends before i i ever got into this but then you start going would they be around if i didn't pay them and then you've got to stop yourself and being like i'm not going to pay them and then you've got to stop yourself and be like that's a crazy thought that i've even ever had that thought but every relationship in your life shifts and changes and you feel like you're going mad and then i think the hard part about being me and maybe being a british artist is that i speak to a lot of artists friends or peers or other people and they love being famous and i'm like we don't relate and i can't relate to you and i'm lucky that i have friends like you know ed sheeran or james bay or bastille who are like me or nile horan who are just like they really just love the real world um and i didn't realize there's such a gap between some artists who really love being artists and really love being different and really love thinking that we're separated by how much money is in our bank which is benign to me um and some artists who are just like this is all cool but this is a real world actually yeah when you become presumably rich people who follow you around hoping money falls out of your pockets yeah you know and and the strange thing is you're so used to seeing reels or tiktoks whatever you know people posting that uh the video of them like mom i bought your house and the mom's like thank you thank you so much but in reality a lot of times you know you go and you're like i'm i can take care of you and they're like yeah no i can take care of myself good yeah like oh shit or it's like yeah why don't you invest in this then and why don't you do that and you're like no no that's that wasn't how this is supposed to go i think that that's actually probably another one of those things that people you know uh don't talk about but it's it's not necessarily like people on the other side wanting to receive it yeah and you know it's like be it's like being at a dinner and be like i got this like i can pay for my own dinner 100 you're like oh i was just trying to like yeah you know so no no problem and i'm that's legit that happens often mega grateful for the people in my life because all of them have reiterated that no amount of money finance support or gifts can replace the relationship and they very much have told me like if you want to give to me give me your time your presence and your energy and just be present when you're with me mm-hmm don't think buying me a new bag or sending me on a holiday or trying to retire me or pay for a dinner is that because that's just the person you are and you've always been that person even when you had nothing like i would rather you just take an afternoon off and i think learning the value of everything has changed because i grew up with nothing so understanding that is is definitely different as well are you happy me i'm even though it sounds like i'm not i'm exceptionally happy and i could tell you the exact reason i'm happy my relationship with my mom's never been better uh the people i surround myself with on tour uh are the best people in the world and i don't just say that like pr wise they ground me they humble me they call me a twat if i'm being a twat and you know they ride and die for everything that this is and i've built a team that they all have their own professional goals within the camp you know like my front of house wants to be the best front of house engineer in the world you know my tm wants to do the best job that he can do my guitarists and basses want to be the best in their profession so it's not about me it's about us you know i'm happy because when i'm home i'm home and i don't have to worry about stuff like i grew up where you know paying rent and avoiding bailiffs was like you know a daily concern and now i could like i don't have to think about running to put five dollars on my electric card because the lights are on and i don't have to think about running to put five dollars on my electric card have gone out in my house that's like an amazing spot to be in and i think more than anything i feel like i'm just being truthful and honest in every interaction that i have and i'm not giving into how easy it is to go that everything's made and everything's good and the more honest i could be between me and the people who choose to listen to my music and i don't call them fans just because like i just feel super cunty saying fans it just feels really weird like oh my god i got fans no they enjoy my music so i think the relationship between me and the people who listen to my music is really good and i'm super happy with that it's weird because you became successful off of the internet yeah but presumably a lot of when you were saying you know you get racist dms and things like that what's your relationship to the internet now a lot more conscious i think before i just really like i just loved it i just did it and it was great and it was an expression of myself and it was super awesome and then i think there's a reality of when you become like an artist who's like got an audience that there is a part to it that's marketing there is a part to it that like is you know growing a career um and i think i've struggled with that because i've i guess i've wanted the best of both worlds of having a career and doing it just for the fact that i love what i do um but then there's elements of your job that like you don't necessarily have control over like which i'm struggling with um and i think that's a part of them figuring that out now is like okay i've got to promote an album and i hate the fact that i have to basically say to people go out and spend money on buying my music that really makes me feel weird but i have to reframe my thinking of that i'm not asking you to go out and pay for my music for me i actually want you to go and listen to my music because i honestly think you might enjoy it and within the and i think that i just have such a gear in my head that like hates the sales part of this job um and i just gotta remember the reason why i'm doing it and the reason i'm doing it is because i love music and music was a reason why i was able to communicate how i felt my emotions and music was my safety blanket in a household that was really difficult to grow up in and as long as those are central to everything that i'm doing i feel okay in this role and in you know manufactured goods like cds and i i hope your fans uh uh buy your vinyl and that helps. But for the most part, you're not asking people to spend more money than they're already spending to listen to your music. You're giving them an opportunity to see inside your world, which is unique because you're unafraid to have a real conversation even in this setting and that bravery will come out in your music. So I think that people who haven't heard it or really listened should because, you know, the person who's sitting across who's willing to be open now is open in the studio too. One of the things that probably makes it really hard to be grounded is that everywhere you go, your songs are played. I mean, how often are you hearing your songs out and about? Like all the time? All the time. Is it weird? It's probably the only ego part of my job that I love. Like, it's so awesome getting in a car and hearing your song. Like, it's awesome. Like going out in public and like taking a shit and like your songs playing. No words can describe that. People say like when you have a kid, like you can't describe that happiness. I'm telling you, when you go for a shit and your song's playing, you're like, oh yeah, this is, that's the closest I can relate to it at the moment. And it's super awesome. And like, I don't know, there's little jovial things. Like I, my wife, I went out the other day and I, I called the wifi company. I was on hold for like two hours. And then, you know, they, they're like, oh, we're going to pass you on again. And then stargazing starts playing. It's like, I've never been more angry at me, but it's even cool that I get to be angry at me. That's so dope. Um, so yeah, I love that part of the job and no matter what people say about radio or TV or traditional media declining, I think any artist is a liar. If they don't say they feel amazing when their songs on a radio, it just hits different. And I don't know why it sounds different for sure. Yeah. All that, all that time. You're like, would this sound good on a radio? Would this sound good in a restaurant? Would this sound good on TV or in a movie? Yeah. And all of a sudden you're doing like, oh man, that sounds real good. That sounds real good. You were saying stargazing, you know, had 3 million, you know, streams in the first week. Well, I, I, we can go down a laundry list of classic artists who are releasing music right now who cannot buy, you know, 3 million streams in the first week, first day, first, but you were getting, you know, like in the first day, first week, what, how. Uh, what, what, what, what if that song is, what is it about stargazing that resonates so well throughout the world? I think firstly, it's a big hook and an easy melody. Um, and it's really cool having international friends. Like I've got friends who live in Spain and France and, you know, Mexico, wherever. And the thing that they always say is like, you don't even need to understand the words. The melody just really cuts through language barriers. And I think that's been a really good thing, you know? And it's, it's, it's true. It's like, there's, I don't know if it's PR friendly or whatever, but people always say like Michael Jackson is the biggest artist in the world. Cause you could go to like the middle of nowhere and there's someone singing his song. Um, and that's the truth. I think great music supersedes language. Um, and I think stargazing was able to reach people at just like a melodic level. Family and friends and stuff must just be like over them, you know, over the moon about how crazy all this is. It's so dope. I think awards for me, again, I'm like, I say this song plays honesty and truth. They're like, they're cool for me, but like the reason I really like love those accolades is cause like, bruh, when you bring in your mum to like an award ceremony and like winning an award and seeing your mum's reaction, that's more fire than the awards. Like it's so sick to have that feeling. Like I played like my first like London headline, like 5,000 people. And like, my mum was sat like right in the middle of the balcony and like people singing about the song. And it's like, that moment was amazing. Cause all these people had chosen to leave the house has chosen to spend their money. And I take none of that for granted. Cause like, it's not cheap to live right now. So that in itself is like sick. And then you put your mum on top of that is like even better. So like awards, accolades, like numbers, all these things are like, for me, they're cool. It's like getting your grades at like school or college. If you went, I went to college and like, I did really well. And I was like, it was good to do it, but it was my mum at graduation was what made that whole thing amazing. And I think I don't live for her, but there's definitely a big part of like my satisfaction and fulfillment that comes from like making her proud. Cause she sacrificed so much. Nice to meet you is a pretty big song. Yeah. Did it right. Good job. Tell me about writing. That was a good day, man. I mean, it was me, uh, plastic Pete and Dan Smith from Bastille, uh, in Brighton, which is where I live now. So sort of like South coast of England. And, uh, we get in the room and they're all such different characters and personalities. Like Dan is very English. Uh, and you know, he's just a really fun character, but super English. And you've got Pete who was super, like super LA, like, we're going to get his God be the biggest thing in the world. And then you've got Dan. Yeah, that sounds good. You know what I mean? And then you've got Plested, which is just sort of like Plested is Plested. It's hard to describe him if you don't know him, but he is a songwriter. He's a real songwriter. But it was all of those characters, like mixed in a glass with tequila and it brought out something, uh, and it brought out nice to meet you. And, um, you know, I found the melody of that song, uh, pretty early on. And I know when something's good, cause like Pete, he starts going for one of these and, uh, it quickly came together and, you know, Dan and Plested both amazing songwriters, like, you know, help piece the parts of the puzzle together. And again, really quick turnaround on the song wrote on that session, like a couple hours. The video for stargazing, when you guys, you know, when super viral sort of like, it was a big part of the whole thing when, when you finished stargazing, was it nice to meet you? When you finished that song, did you have the same feeling that you did when you finished stargazing? Oh yeah. It was a vibe. Even though I was the last of the party on that song, we'd done like three other songs in that camp and everyone was telling me like, nice to meet you as the one. And I was like, no, it's good, but it's like, it's a bop. And it was the same with stargazing. If I'm being completely honest, like, I thought it was good, but that one who it was, it was Joe Edison, my A&R who really loved that song. And I, I wasn't sold because like, sometimes like I'd need a tiny bit of production to like be sold on a, on a record, even though it's not all about the production. It's like, sometimes it helps me understand where the song lives and sits and they were both very bare bone. Um, and Pete's great at like, not doing a lot for it to get to a place where it feels special. So for stargazing, it was a drone. It was a dun, dun, dun, dun. That just turned it into like, okay, I want to go all in on this song. And then with nice to meet you, it just felt way too happy, clappy. And I was like, I can't see myself like, oh, ah, nice. And it felt super country. And I was like, I'm not shaboozy. I was like, even though many people get us, racism is crazy. But anyway, with nice to meet you. Oh, dude, two black guys with dreads to the population. They all look the same. I mean, we've had like Teddy tell stories about him and jelly roll, but those guys kind of have like a similar vibe. They got face tattoos. They're like, that's a thing. I don't think of you as shaboozy as being in the same, like you guys don't even like nothing. I don't think so either, but you'll be surprised. You'd be surprised. Um, but yeah, but then, you know, when we sort of, it was still sort of like, you know, the, the, the stomp claps on the offbeat, but we moved some of the production away from country. I was like, now it feels like it's his own thing. Um, and that was really cool. Yeah. I mean, speaking of other doppelgangers of yours now horn, I know man, same complexion, everything is mental. Uh, uh, we just hung out with Niall legend. Um, you know, you, when you were in, in your learning phase of writing, yeah. One direction's the biggest band in the world, like literally. So how does the relationship between you and Niall start? A lot of hatred is such a dick, right? I hated that man growing up quite literally the nicest human on the planet. No, I hated him. And I'll tell you why you literally hit it growing up. Right. Yeah. With that fucking boy band being like the sex icons of like the UK at the moment, it was like, no girl was going to fancy me when you had Niall Horan walking about. And I just had so much built up frustration. Cause I was just like, you just were the reason I never got love for all the secondary school. And, uh, you were the beauty standard. So I was like, you, you bastard. Um, but then I met him and I was like, I really like this guy. What's the difference between writing with, you know, uh, uh, somebody who's a superstar like that versus not. It's hard. Cause the superstars I met being Niall and Ed Sheeran that you've met them. They're not, they don't carry the superstar sort of like characteristics of where they like being superstars. They just like being normal dudes. So it was like going into right with pretty much anyone I've been in a right with, like there was no ego. um i've been lucky enough to avoid ego pretty much my whole journey i've met met it a few times at events and stuff and i hate it uh but he's a normal dude yeah yeah um let's do some rapid fire i'm just asking let's start with uh are you famous now oh in some parts of the world like where in the uk i would say i'm getting stopped every day yeah in the uk for sure it's gotta be great right over here is it i mean i should say it's got to be great because i feel like the people who come up to you are probably mostly fans right yeah i'm lucky i've got the most respectful like people ever who like listen to my music is they just all are normal human beings it's really nice actually i think maybe also because a lot of your you know your struggles are public i imagine that it pulls in a there's this concept of um what's called parasocial and you know when i see meet somebody in public often who who knows the podcast or whatever it's like often the conversation gets really deep very quickly absolutely because like they're in a they're they've we've had to have a different relationship yeah you know being a an honest songwriter artist my assumption is that you also find yourself in deep conversations very quickly yeah you know how how does it feel seeing that kind of um you know like to me that's that's like a big part of success yeah you know how does it make you feel uh i think it adds to my how cognizant i am of like the role that i play now like i would be naive to think to a lot of people i'm not a role model and i think i would not my my mom's great at this actually uh it's a sidestepping a little but my mom always is a person who reminds me like you have a voice and people listen to your voice and the decisions in how you present yourself and the things in which you lead with are super important and just be like super i guess aware of just like you know you're a black male british artist there'll be a lot of young black boys who look and sound like you're looking up to you so don't go getting yourself involved in anything stupid or doing anything dumb or saying anything that doesn't represent you because you're not in that situation anymore where people won't listen to you and she's also very aware of like and you have a real opportunity to change the narrative of what a modern artist is and what a modern artist is and what a modern artist is and what a modern man is you know it's like we're so surrounded and we have back and forth philosophical conversations about the manosphere and you know people's uh uh people's thoughts and and opinions on how the world and how the world should run but the way i was raised i was raised by my mom and my sister really it's like i have i have such an appreciation for women and their role in society and i think um now when i think about it it's like those are the conversations which are pertinent and happening every single day and those are the ones that are the ones that are the most important to me prioritizing my thinking and the way in which i choose to you know speak and do the things as honestly as i do how did you meet a wife with all this stuff going on i mean like how did you you know when what's the story of how do you have a personal life with everything happening how do i meet a wife i don't know that's a great question and when when do you have time for a uh when do you when do you have time for a personal life uh my personal life is sort of on the road with me like a day-to-day manager pj i've known him since school we're best mates so super lucky that he's with me all the time my whole band i've known eight plus years they're like friends from that existed all before this uh you know i fly my mom out every now and then to tour my brother out every now and then to tour uh so i kind of keep home close do you do you want to ever have like family absolutely bro yeah i don't want to be that 40 and i've all i've got is like plaques to show that's that's not what i want in life of all the accolades you have president obama putting stargazing on his summer playlist holy shit yeah that was sick it's so sick that was sick there's like three p three things like british people know about america is like who the president is like you drive on the other side of the road and like your food's got a bunch of shit on it and you're like oh my god i'm gonna die i'm gonna die i'm gonna share that so it's like it's pretty fucking sick i got one of the three how do you feel about and this the fact that this career has already been going on for a while and that you that it's all happened before your debut album when you've talked about how you know you have this stargazing up here and nice to meet you up here and and you feel like you didn't get the journey all the way up does releasing your debut album in the next few weeks feel like that completes that journey that beginning journey yeah that's how i see it in my head i feel like you know and that's why the songs are included on the album it's like i wanted you know from starting out to now to be like put as like step one like if it was a series this would be like season one you know and for me that feels what the album is like season one of milesmith you don't have to answer this so uh but has your dad resurfaced at all uh i've not heard from him no um but i don't know how i would because no one's really in contact with him nor the other way around and it's kind of ideal yeah yeah it's just interesting you know being at the top of a of an industry yeah you know do you feel like there's um you know i i certainly have a few things that drive me forward in my career path and it feels like the traumatic parts of my life are a driver yeah um do you feel like that's still a driver driver for you no it was but it's not anymore uh i used to live my life trying to fill that hole um but i think the reason why my circumstance is so many so different to so many people's separation is like my life is so different from the life of my parents and my My mom genuinely didn't leave a stone unturned in parenting. And I didn't feel like I've missed out on really anything. I mean, apart from like learning how to shave my balls without cutting them and like shaving my beard, like she covered all bases. That was not where I thought that was going to go. Exciting to know. Are you melody or lyrics first? Feeling first. I know that's a cop out, but sometimes the lyric gives me a feeling, sometimes the melody does. I think that your journey is just really exciting. First of all, thank you for doing this. Thank you. When, as the songwriting game is really interesting that you're not a part of because you're busy writing for yourself. And. When you go into a room, especially for pitch, everyone's like, we need something like blank. And there was a, I don't know if it's a rumor or whatever it is, but it's like, Hey, Myles Smith will, they'll, they'll look at some outside songs, which apparently you don't need. Um, which is disappointing because you're fantastic and it'd be great to send you songs, but it's this interesting thing where you. The skill that you have as a songwriter, as an artist has pushed countless rooms of great songwriters to try to come up with something good enough that you might like it enough to even listen to it. Wow. It's probably the biggest compliment I can give you because there are so many artists that come and go that. Nobody cares to get in the room with, or try to emulate or try to send them songs because you're just kind of like, this is just, this is coming and going. And it's a thing, whatever, but I think everyone aspires to write for singers. If people actually sing like a melody and, and that's, you know, you were saying from the beginning, you know, the stuff that inspires you are these big melodies and that kind of music, you know, the, the joke that we. Talk about a lot. It's like, if, if, you know, if, if, uh, I will always love you came out today, it'd be like, and I, I will always love you. So accurate. You know, nobody's sitting, everyone's afraid to sing. Everyone's afraid to put themselves out there and hear. And I love hearing your story because it's so vulnerable to really go and sing. And it's what, it's probably why it's so fun. Yeah, because you feel like, oh, if he's doing it, I can do it too. It's like, gives us license, but you, you've created a, a disguise for yourself. Without even having your debut album out. This is so confusing already that that a lot of writers throughout the world are spending time trying to create songs that are as good as and compete with the songs you've already done. And like you said, this is only chapter one. You're so young. Like we're going to be having this conversation every album in like 10 years, you're going to have five more albums. And it's crazy that this is only the beginning because your music's timeless. It already feels like it's been around for a long time. So thank you for doing this. Thank you so much. Yeah, no, that's incredible. Well, there you go. That's your first interview of And The Runner is. But I do want to hear if you can find those demos, like, you know, I'm going to hear those demos, you know. It's going to be a. Oh, let's go. Text them over. Yeah, that's cool. Oh, here they are. Oh, that's great. Oh, God. Oh, God. Oh, that's so dope. You were never stranger. Oh, you were right there. Oh, God. That's fire. Dude. That is. We were so much 90s, 40s. We were too down at that point, dude. We were so 90s, 40s, dude. Holy smokes. And that night, like, they both threw up from Taco Bell. It was scenes. Wait. Yeah. I'm sorry. Tell me about the night you wrote Stargazing. Yeah, dude. It was a movie. It was like, started the song with, like, they drank so much 90s, 40s. It was not long after I signed the label deal. So, like, like. Basically, I was like, oh, they're, like, they're going to do anything. I was like, book me a mansion. And I was like, sure. I was like, in Malibu. They're like, sure. I was like, I want Pete and Jesse there as well. I was like, sure. I was like, and alcohol. I was like, sure. I was like, holy snap. I was like, what? I could do this now? Not knowing that it's, like, all recording budget and I've got to pay for it anyway in the end. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So, we're, like, there for, like, a few days and we're drinking 90-42 and eating pizza and, like, it's just us. And I'd never been Malibu. Like, I mean, prior to going, I thought it was just a drink. So, it's crazy. And I didn't realize no one lived there. So, like, it's three of us in this huge house and, like, we've not seen any other life in, like, five days. And, like, this house stinks, dude. It's like, we're all walking around in, like, our pants just, like, take away everywhere. We start writing Stargazing and it's coming along. And it's moving. And it's feeling really good. But it's, like, late into the night and we're, like, okay, we'll come back to it tomorrow. And in that time, Jess and Pete had ordered Taco Bell. And I don't eat meat. So, like, I didn't have any. And, like, I swear to God, 30 minutes later, like, you heard outrageous, violent vomiting from, like, over some. Next day, like, wake up, like, you guys are good. They're like, dog. Like, dog, we're not good, man. Like, finish Stargazing. This is the beginning of a movie where you're going to suddenly poison them in order to be, like, you must write the next song. They're like, what? I'm so sick. They're like, damn it. Oh, here's another one. This one's from Solo. People who are wondering how I have the demos right now, it's either from Peter Fenn or it's because I was hiding in the house the whole time. But I'm not going to tell you which one. Okay. I like the first one. You're like. That's cool. I like the energy of, like. He's clapping his hands, by the way. Yeah. This is long. This is like 10 minutes of stuff. Let's see what the end sounds like. I like a new lyric there, but I like him meeting the solo twice. Low key. Yeah, it's nice. It's nice. It'd be so great if that's what the final recording has of just, like, jump in and just to get sag after. It's just like, I want that union check. So, check this out. I got that. There has to be a better voice than that. I must have something. That is brilliant. It's funny. Peter asked, you know, in the last three years, what has been one of the biggest pinch me moments? Oh, um, that, why did, that's such a genuine question. Well, this is, this is the rest of it. That's why I'm going to leave it on my phone. I'll leave it on my phone. I'm not going to share that. But that's why we were laughing earlier. It was like, some things are better left on a chain. That is so good. But how great is that? Like, I will say this, that, and although people might be waiting for the answer of that, Peter, you probably won't get it. Um, the, you know, you just want to have, even in the business, like. It's nice to have chains of friends in the business. Like you were saying, sometimes you question like, well, what is the relationship with all these people? But the reality is like, you don't send those texts if you're not friends. 100%. You know, everybody understands the failure of a song. That's zero. But there are certain types of successes that you share with those people. And if there are good vibes in that, that, that, that can deepen a relationship. That's unlike any other friendship I have. My, my chain of best friends for the last 25. Years is very funny. It's been funny all morning. Like I love my friends, but we all have different jobs. We do different things. We don't really talk about our jobs all that much, you know, and some of them are Emmy winners and shit like that. And like, we don't, we don't talk about our jobs. We're proud of each other, but that's what that is. Yeah. My friends from the business. It's like the ones that you share success with like that, you know, like vomiting Taco Bell while you're writing a worldwide number one song success, like only you guys understand what it was from that moment. Yeah. You know, and you get a glimpse when you hear that story and you hear the thing, but you can only laugh that hard with certain people who are like, Hey man, we're going through this together. And this is an amazing thing. So it's, you know, like I said in the intro and I was alluding to them and, and Plested and, you know, Dan and Steph and like, you're surrounded by like really good, good people. And. And so it, it makes sense that, that the music's good too. Thank you, dude. Appreciate it. Miles Smith. Miles Smith, man. What'd you think? What a guy. What a guy, man. What a lad. Well done. That feels authentic. I gotta say like, you know, I know his music and I know, you know, our friends that work with him. But, um, I don't know that I had any expectations coming into it. So I like those kinds of interviews sometimes where there's not enough of a history that everybody knows it. You know, there's some brief history things that you can get cause he's not shy, but, um, I was really pleased at how grounded he was and, and honestly, it's just, it's so refreshing when you do interviews with people where they don't mind going deep. 100%. I felt the same thing and they're just willing to kind of like be real, you know, sometimes like not, not that we've had a lot of this, but like every now and then you can get someone who's a little guarded, they, you know, they don't really want to go too deep or to get too real, you know, it's, and you're leaning more into, um, you know, the album or whatever, which is totally fine. But when someone's willing to just be real and put where their heart on their sleeve a little bit, obviously. Like, it's just an, an amazing conversation. We've done interviews. I'm sure every, uh, podcast news agency, whatever journalist has to deal with when somebody gives parameters and like, Hey, well they'll talk, but they won't talk about this. And, uh, it doesn't happen often, but when it does, you're like, uh, if, how do you, if you, there are a lot of people we haven't been able to interview because they don't want to talk about the thing that everybody wants to hear, or they're sick of talking talking about it, but even from the perspective of a songwriter, Like, how did that affect that or as an artist? And so when somebody is just willing to talk about the thing and the things, and it just makes it like a real conversation. And, you know, again, like, I think, you know, we talk about this a lot. Everyone who starts a podcast is like, oh, I'm going to do, it's just a conversation between two friends. And then after like 10 episodes of it being an equal 50-50 conversation, it's like, nobody wants to hear the host talk. Sure. Unless if they're a comedian, maybe that's the thing. Or like if they're with friends where the whole thing is that they're the characters in every episode. Like, I guess maybe I understand it. But at some point, like, you know, you want a real conversation, but the only way it happens is if somebody's willing to have a real conversation with you. Yeah, 100%. And in this case, like, somebody's willing to even talk and not just, you're not just like leading, leading. You kind of can leave it. And he was willing to just tell you the real story of the journey of a kid from, you know, a working class, single mom family. Like, what a hero. Man, you and I have little children at home. And to see what a mom does is already amazing. But to have a mom do it without any other familial support at home. Incredible. I can't. I can't understand it because it is hard enough. I know. When you hear those stories, you just, I mean, God bless. Yeah. And you see the way, you know, obviously the reason why I think he's, he talks about his mom a lot and he's like, you know, he's the way he is because of that. One thing, a little sidebar I'll say is, you know, and I know this a little bit from talking with Peter, but what a voice. You know, sometimes you heard it when you just picked up the guitar, started singing, it's like, you know, there's the voices that are good, but they need a lot of love and, you know, EQs and compression and things to like really bring the voice out. And some voices don't need nothing. And he just got one of those voices. He starts singing and it's just, there it is. It's really, really great voice. This is a compliment to Peter also, but to get into, to work with an artist who doesn't have a record deal yet and to be willing to do an entire EP or album or albums worth of material before a deal. Like that's just something that I never did really. Yeah. I think, except unless I was the artist. Sure. You know, but I never did that with somebody else. And that just takes, even if the person has an incredible voice, even if like, it's hard not to let the business cloud judgment. Yeah. And I always respect somebody in the game who is willing to dive in with an artist because they loved them and believed in them before the business like showed up. Yeah. That is, that's just, you know. And shout out to, I mean, I'm about to just gush on my, some friends, but like Peter, I've said this from the beginning, even to him is just like, he's. He's, he has a bit of that artist whisperer talent. Like he, he just can, he can connect with people on a different level musician or even not. He, he can connect with people on that sort of level in his energy and just the way he communicates. And I think he just has a talent for that. It's like one of his superpowers actually. Yeah. And so to see this work out the way it's worked out and go the way it's gone. I'm just, I'm proud of him. I'm happy for him. And I know he's going to do it again with, you know, the, the next, uh, artist that comes across his plate. So. Yeah. I mean, I, I, I wish the best for miles and I hope that, that the albums is success. But again, like these people can, you can release six albums in your career, 10 albums in your career, and he already has two hits off this album. The fact that those haven't come out on an album yet is insane. So he'll be back on. Yeah. Yeah. I'm sure. I'm excited to watch his journey, man. What a nice guy. Yeah. It's a lovely conversation. Fun to listen to. All right. Gotta go.