Adam Lambert’s new album reflects his “guilt” over “having fun or laughing”.
The 44-year-old singer – who shot to fame in 2009 after finishing as runner-up on the eighth season of American Idol – admitted that due to the “state of the world right now”, he often feels guilty for enjoying himself and his new record Adam explores this.
He told Variety: “I think thematically, lyrically, the thing that I wanted to explore was this razor-thin edge in-between something that’s a positive, healthy experience and something that might be challenging or negative. That’s life, you know? You wake up, you might have a really great experience or be just enjoying a relationship, and then sometimes it’s the complete opposite. If it’s romance or attraction, it can be really beautiful, and then ever so quickly it can tip into obsession or possession or frustration.
“Or the same thing with going out and having a good time with your friends and having a few drinks. That can be an escape that we all love and need, and then it can ever so quickly go into ‘OK, now I’m overdoing it,’ or, ‘Now I’m sad because of my habits.’ I tried to lay the album out sequence-wise where it goes back and forth between those two sides of the same coin. What do they say? It’s cognitive dissonance. Two things can be true at once.
“Especially with the state of the world right now, it’s tricky. It can be very overwhelming, all the stuff that’s going on, and I’ve had conversations with friends that are like, ‘Sometimes I feel guilty that I’m even going out or having fun or laughing.’ We need that; as humans, we need to balance it all out. But it’s not always easy to do. So I think the album reflects that state a little bit, of trying to find the good despite the bad, and also just accepting what’s not great.
“As far as it relates to me personally, looking in the mirror and really honestly seeing all parts of yourself is not always the easiest thing to do. It’s not always easy for our egos and our psyche to admit that there’s something about ourselves that’s not great. Or if you messed up or you made a mistake, you have to own it. I think another part of growing up is self-acceptance – like, radical self-acceptance – and not always trying to be a people-pleaser or perfectionist, but actually just being a realist.”
Lambert – who chose Eat You Alive as the first track from the new album Adam – also explained that he did not feel he could make a whole record that was just “happy, happy, happy”.
He said: “I think to make a whole album that was all escapist, happy, happy, happy – that part is also necessary; I think that people need that as medicine right now – but I think just as important is to tap into the harder-to-sing-about places and moments. It’s good medicine either way.
“I mean, I always try to put on a good face for the public. I guess that’s the people pleaser in me, that’s the performer in me. I’ve always tried to be the best version of myself. None of it’s false, it’s just I’m pushing one part of my personality for people to see. And underneath that surface there’s a lot more going on. I’ve had my good days and my bad days. I’ve had challenges and my own types of struggles and ups and downs with relationships and, I mean, I’m human. I think I’m becoming more and more comfortable with the idea of letting the cracks show a little bit more, and being a little bit more unfiltered with my fans and my audience.”