Will Young is back with his ninth studio album, Light It Up, his first for BMG.
Released August 9, Light It Up is Will Young’s first album of original songs in five years.
Young has still been productive in recent years, though, including Top 3 2021 covers album Crying On The Bathroom Floor (27,729 sales to date – Official Charts Company). His 20 Years – The Greatest Hits peaked at No.6 the following year.
As well as teaming up with new collaborators PhD, the Swedish production duo, he reunited with Andy Cato of Groove Armada and Jim and Mima Elliot, who worked with him on 2011 album Echoes (513,749 sales to date). The new album title track was written and produced by PhD with rising UK songwriter Tom King.
Since 2002, Will Young has earned 10 UK Top 10 albums (including four No.1s) and 11 Top singles (of which four reached the summit).
Young is now preparing for a huge tour of intimate venues featuring acoustic performances, which launches on September 3. The Light It Up Tour, promoted by AEG Presents, is billed as an evening of hits, new songs, stories and conversation.
The singer and songwriter is represented by agency CAA and Fascination Management.
Here, the enduring UK pop star joins Music Week for a wide-ranging chat covering his evolving industry career, middle age and embracing Scandinavian production for his new music…
Your new album has been billed as a return to joyous pop. Is that how you would describe it?
“I would say it's joyous pop actually. I’m not really sure what happened. I was writing quite a sort of psychedelic, folk album, which I'm sure no one would have listened to but I was having a lovely time. And then I got in touch with PhD [producer/writer duo Peter Wallevik & Daniel Davidsen]. I'd never really worked with people over in Denmark or Sweden. [Earlier in my career] I decided that I was going to write with Nitin Sawhney, and I'm pleased that I did, but I was quite contrary. I thought at the time, I’m just going to be shoved around these people [top producers at the time] and I won't have a career in two years. So I managed to work with someone like Stephen Lipson who had come from the Art Of Noise and done the Annie Lennox stuff. I discovered Robin Thicke before he was discovered by the world – I was like, this guy's a great writer, I want to write with him. So I sort of bypassed Scandinavia.”
That sound was huge when you were first around, though, wasn't it?
“Yeah, massive. I just didn't want to be in that realm then, and I didn't feel like it would work – and I think I made the right decision actually. But [for this album] I thought, ‘Oh my god, Scandinavian pop, of course, now I can do it – it is the most amazing pop music.’ It’s been 22 years and so that's what changed. Some of it I wrote, some of it I didn't, I just thought this is brilliant. So that's how it came about. Because I don't mind if I don't write all the songs or not – other people do [mind that], I don't. So I enjoyed writing it, when I did write the tunes, and I enjoyed A&Ring my own record – I mean, I started at a publisher, I used to work for Sony publishing. I produced my own record this time, I really enjoyed that, I hadn't really done much of that before.”
I was going to ask, is that production something you've tried before?
“No, not as much weirdly. Some people, maybe my therapist, would say that I've now got better self esteem than I used to have [laughs]. Maybe I finally got some confidence. But I was like, well, this is what we should do with this, and we should do this with this. You know, one song was completely different – it was like an Avril Lavigne song. There’s a song called The Worst, which I think is one of the best ballads I've done since Leave Right Now, to be honest. But that was like a rocky, teen angsty American sort of song. And I said, ‘This is a brilliant ballad’, even though it wasn't a ballad [at that point]. So I really enjoyed that part of it, and I loved doing all the visuals and the videos, that has been so much fun.”
In pop terms with you turning to Scandinavian hitmakers – something you deliberately decided not to do at the start – does this feel like a victory lap in your career?
“You know what, maybe it does a little bit, actually. I'll take that, I quite like that. But not in a conceited way, more like a self-celebration. I think there's something really great about being older. You just don’t really give a shit, do you? I don't really take it that seriously, if I'm honest, and I just really enjoy it. I've finally worked out how to enjoy it. I take the craft seriously but I know I'm not saving lives. I know what I'm really good at, and I really believe in it. I just want to have fun and enjoy it.”
Going back to the beginning of your career, what appealed to you about taking part in Pop Idol?
“It was difficult, I was just this innocent 22-year-old with a yearning to sing and I didn’t feel like I had a place in the industry. But at the same time, I also knew how very lucky I was. With those shows, they are what they are and if you’re good, you’ll stick around. My time on Pop Idol was so joyous; it was so naive and no one knew they were going to make any money. But I think there’s a deeper conversation to be had in terms of the duty of care these shows have. The powers that be have this responsibility for what has happened within TV talent shows; I think there’s a much bigger story to tell there.”
I want to tour in all the places that I've never been to – if it's just me and a piano, I can go anywhere
Will Young
You’re going out on a huge tour, how many dates is it now?
“I think it's 60, we keep on adding them. I’m like a pop version of Miss Havisham. I'm just sitting in my house screaming ‘More! More dates!’, surrounded by soft furnishings and loads of dogs. ‘We sold it out – We should add more!” Yeah, that's been a really cool thing. Because that was something that I did originally for an album launch when I did the covers album, and I'm really proud of that album. We did four or five album launches around the UK, so they were small venues. At the time, I said: Why don’t people ask questions, that can be quite fun? And I just enjoyed it so much, it was so funny and kind of beautiful. Because you'd go from people being quite funny, me being quite funny, and then I'd sing a really sad song; that sort of juxtaposition would work really well. So I said to my manager, can we go everywhere in the UK? I want to go to all the places that I've never been to, because you can [normally] only go to a certain amount of places and also people have to travel loads. I just think that's a bit unfair – if I have a big band, I get it. But if it's just me and a piano, I can go anywhere.”
So will it be the same kind of format for this tour?
“Yeah, people in the audience emailing questions. But the problem is my family get hold of the email address, and then they email in questions when they're not there. Last time I did it, my mother said, ‘Can you tell your father to stop varnishing the chairs?’ or something. And then my father sent me an email – it was still coming up live [during the show] – saying ‘Your mother shouldn't have this email address’. And I'm like, you shouldn't fucking have this email address, I'm on stage! Here's a novel idea, why don't you talk to each other, you're literally in the same house? That's quite amusing.”
What's your relationship like with manager Peter Loraine [who recently won the Strat at the Music Week Awards]?
“I would say fractious at best [laughs] – fractious, bitter, embittered, that man is calculating. No, I think it's a good relationship. We’ve known each other a very long time, through 19 Management, he was always around. We feel more like friends really. I never had a manager who was a gay man. I think it means something to both of us. We're in the same age bracket, so I would say we both know when things were not as easy as they maybe are now. We can have conversations that neither of us were ever able to have before with either their artist clients or their manager. And I think it brings us closer together.
“I just listen to them all [at Fascination Management]. It makes life so much easier. He's got very good instincts. I came in and gave a presentation for this album. They hadn't seen that side of me, because when they started working with me, it was still in the Covid times, my brother died and then I did the greatest hits. So they had never seen me work my own original [song] albums. They didn't realise that I did things like pie charts. Remember, I once worked for Sony publishing. I did a whole presentation on this album. I was like, ‘This is what it's going to be, this is what we're doing with the video, this is what we're doing with the artwork, this is what we're calling it, this is the vibe.’ They were like, ‘Fabulous!’. They had never had an artist do a pie chart before.”
Finally you have mentioned a couple of times that you might quit music by the time you’re 50. Is that still the case?
“Someone asked me that, and I didn't have any projects, I was not sure what I wanted to do musically. So at the time I said it, I think I actually genuinely did [believe it] because I couldn't really envisage being in my fifties and being a pop star. But now I sort of feel like, okay, I think you can do it. You just have to sort of embrace your age, I think I've worked it out. So I've got about four different musical projects that I'd like to do. Considering I'm 45, that will probably take it past 50. At this age you forget, don't you? I thought I was 44 the other day. I think I'm 45. So it's a long-winded way of saying, no, I don't think I will retire from music.”
Interview by Anna Fielding
PHOTO: Jamie Noise
