IN A WORLD EXCLUSIVE, SAM SMITH GRANTS ATTITUDE THE FIRST INTERVIEW ABOUT HIS SECOND ALBUM AND LEAD SINGLE, TOO GOOD AT GOODBYES. IF THAT ISN’T ENOUGH, HIS INTERVIEWER IS SIR ELTON JOHN. WHO BETTER TO CHAT TO SAM ABOUT SONGWRITING, COMING OUT AS GAY, AND BECOMING A MULTI-PLATINUM-SELLING GLOBAL ARTIST?

WORDS: DARREN STYLES

Sam wears shirt by Prada at MR PORTER, rings (throughout) Sam’s own

PHOTOGRAPHY: MATT LAMBERT

FASHION: JOSEPH KOCHARIAN

Sam wears polo shirt by Prada at MR PORTER

Sam Smith’s second album is about to land, and anyone in the music business will tell you it’s harder to pull off a success second time around. But Sam’s 2014 debut has sold more than 12 million copies worldwide to date — and the sole single in-between albums became the only James Bond theme ever to hit number one in the UK, and won him an Academy Award. So does that guarantee a second smash or just pile on the pressure?

Well, one man might know. Sir Elton John may be many things — showman, philanthropist, husband, father, art collector, activist — but before he’s any of these, he’s a musician. A celebrated singer-songwriter with a career spanning six decades, more than 30 studio albums, countless singles, collaborations and compilations, and a sold-out tour schedule that has lapped the globe like an errant but ever-present satellite.

Elton overcame the “second-album syndrome” that affects many artists — by becoming more successful still. His eponymous follow-up to 1969’s Empty Sky yielded Your Song, which audiences around the world still sing back to him word-perfect during live performances in 2017.

Who better than Elton, then, to be the first person other than Sam and his close-knit team to hear the follow-up to 2014’s In The Lonely Hour?

So, the week before Sam grants Attitude intimate access to his home in North London for our exclusive shoot by Matt Lambert, we fly out to Elton’s home in the hills above Nice on France’s Côte d’Azur — to find out what he thought about the album.

ELTON: So here we are talking about your new album, which, for you, is a big challenge because your first album, In The Lonely Hour, was one of the most successful debut records ever. You have five number one singles in there, you had four Grammys, and afterwards you won an Oscar for the James Bond theme.

The debut is one of those albums — a tapestry that people will buy for ever. So this new album is massive for you, and you wanted to take your time on it, right? SAM: Well, hearing you say all of those things makes me shit myself, so thanks (laughs). It’s insane, really.

But yes, I wanted — after all of that — to get back to some sort of sense of normality. Not just for the music but also to clear my mind. It was really important for me to just step away, to be at home in London with my family and my friends. I pretty well took a year off.

I wanted to get back to a very real place, because it’s so important for me for my music to be relatable. And how can you create something that’s relatable if your life isn’t relatable in any way?

E: You have to be ready to do it, too. A lot of artists are pressured to do another album very quickly to follow up, because record companies want that.

I think that what you’ve done is approach things the right way: you had the success, you then went away and you weren’t too engulfed in your fame. You didn’t particularly like it much, right?

S: No, I hate it! (laughs) Actually, I didn’t hate it, in fact there’s a bit of me, a large part of me, that adores it. You know, I wouldn’t do it if I didn’t. I love my music being out there, being heard — and that feeling of hearing a crowd sing your song back is just addictive.