HER POWEREFUL VOICE AND SONGS ABOUT JILTED LOVE HAVE MADE THE LONDON-BORN SINGER A MASSIVE STAR AND A FAVOURITE AMONG GAY MEN

WORDS: ADAM DUXBURY

Paloma Faith

{ BIG GAY FOLLOWING }

OUTSPOKEN AND GENUINELY OFFBEAT, 36-year-old singer Paloma Faith manages to be both a massive musical star and a humble artist, who’s refreshingly free of bullshit. She paved the way for singers such as Adele and Amy Winehouse, was covering herself in fake blood on stage long before Gaga donned a meat dress, and spent years preforming burlesque and cabaret before hitting the big time.

Throughout her career she’s become a master at dissecting matters of the heart on hits such as New York, Only Love Can Hurt Like This and Picking Up The Pieces. And with her first three albums all going doubleplatinum (the only British female to do so besides Adele), her formula of soulful pop songs about jilted love, delivered in that powerful voice, has proven irresistible.

Paloma has also starred in films such as St. Trinians and The Imaginarium of Dr Parnassus and was a judge on The Voice, but for years she admits to having felt like the underdog. With the arrival of her new album The Architect, things changed; she’s become a mother and has decided to turn her gaze outwards to sing about the state of the world through a collection of songs with a socio-political twist. And she’s never sounded better.

This new album is full of curveballs isn’t it? You’ve got Owen Jones, Samuel L Jackson and a song about a third world war. Is this a major departure compared with your other albums?

Yeah, I hope so. But I read a review yesterday that said it’s the same old shit again and I was like “Oh no, not cool!” Maybe they’ve been listening to the previous album by mistake! But yes, it does, and I think that’s a combination of feeling more confident about changing direction because of the platform that I got from that earlier album, which was my most successful to date, winning a Brit, and having the first two number ones of my career; one in the UK and one in Australia. I felt as if I paved the way with them. But I also felt — and this might sound bad — that I was changing so much having given birth, that I had to try harder to confirm my place. [Previously] I’d been in lots of different situations with labels and put under pressure to release stuff quickly, but this time I put my foot down and said, “it’s not ready”. I wanted it to be perfect. And I genuinely believe this is the first record I’ve released where there is no stone unturned; I was co-producer on a lot of it, even stuff I didn’t get credited for — because I’m a woman in the music industry. But I don’t even care, I just wanted it to be exactly right and I feel that it is.