Sam Smith suffered from writer’s block when making his new album ‘The Thrill Of It All’ after falling into a deep sadness about a break-up.
The ‘Too Good At Goodbyes’ singer will release the follow-up to his acclaimed 2014 debut LP ‘In The Lonely Hour’ next Friday (03.11.17), and he has revealed the split from "the most beautiful, loveliest person in the world" left him in despair at himself more than the guy.
Sam, 25, says the separation inspired five songs on the record and his "saddest song" to date ‘Burning’, on which he sings about how he had "no friends to turn to" after the relationship ended.
Talking about how the split affected him, he told The Sun’s Bizarre Life podcast: "It wasn’t this hateful break-up, it was more about my relationship with myself. The reason it ended was because I had such a poor relationship with myself when I was writing this record and I didn’t like myself. Also I hate the word ‘dumped’. I wasn’t dumped, it just didn’t work out and he decided that it wasn’t working out, not me. So ‘dumped’!"
Sam took a break from his studio sessions and went on vacation with his family for three weeks and ramped up the partying and drinking in a big way, admitting he "flirted with danger" like lots of other 20-somethings.
But when he was due to return to work he found that he had lost his mojo for songwriting, but his team pulled him out of his "sad" mood.
He shared: "’Burning’ is hands-down the most personal song I’ve ever written. I had broken up with a guy and I went on holiday with my family and had three weeks off from writing, which is the only period I had off from doing it. And I really went for it with the partying, I was just going out a lot. You sometimes wanna be a bit rebellious and you kind of want to ruin something great. That’s the only way I can explain it."
Discussing how getting back to his music pulled him out of his despondent state, he added: "I flirted with a bit of danger when I was making the record. I don’t think I did anything that any other 25-year-old wouldn’t do, you know? I was just not looking after myself and just didn’t like what I was seeing in the mirror. And when I get sad about one thing I tend to get sad about everything else. It all came out and I couldn’t write. I couldn’t get in the studio and I was cancelling sessions.
"My team called me and they were like, ‘You’ve got to get into the studio.’
"It was music that saved me again and really just got my head in the right head space."
Sam Smith admits a break-up affected the recording of his LP
