Sam Fender released his second album last year, Seventeen Going Under, a chronicle of the pitfalls that marked the end of his adolescence. The dark Briton seemed destined to exorcise the wounds of this sometimes difficult youth through music. We discussed it with him by videoconference last April.
Posted at 11:00 a.m.
Some call you the heir to British rock. Have you always imagined having this career as a musician?
My father and my brother are musicians. I was about 8 years old when I got my first guitar. It was the first thing in which I had talent. It was natural to sing at home, so I always had the confidence to do it. I’ve never been afraid to get into it. Around the age of 13, I knew that was what I was going to do for the rest of my life.
Your lyrics are one of the things that audiences and critics appreciate most about your songs. Did writing come as naturally to you as playing guitar and singing?
I was not very good at school and one day, a teacher told me that I spoke like a first class speaker, but that I wrote very badly. I stayed after school, and she taught me to write. And when I was about 15-16, I had A’s in writing. I started to write poetry. It was pretty bad, but little by little, I got to where I am.
You come from North Shields, in the north of England. Did where you grew up have a big impact on your songs?
Absolutely. The North East is one of the most deprived places in Britain. It’s rough. But it’s also beautiful and charming. Some of the people I grew up with are the funniest I’ve met in my life. We develop a particular sense of humor when we live in poverty. My favorite comedians are those who are very angry. This humor and this anger are found in my music. […] Bruce Springsteen had a huge influence on me. He’s from Jersey Shore and I’m from Geordie Shore. What Springsteen describes and what I saw on my way to New Jersey reminds me of home.
On your second album, Seventeen Going Under, you actually talk a lot about your childhood in North Shields, the things you experienced there, the political opinions that it left you with. Why did you want to tell this specific period of your life?
Because I started therapy! And because we were in lockdown and nothing was happening, I wasn’t seeing anyone. So I wrote about me. My psychologist made me talk about my childhood. And that’s all I was thinking at the time. Writing the album was very cathartic. It brought me closer to my parents too. It allowed me to better understand my father – the song about him [Spit of You] is his favorite, by the way, surprisingly!
On parle des textes, mais sur le plan de l’instrumentation, même s’il y a toujours beaucoup de guitares, on sent que vous avez voulu en faire plus…
Je voulais que ce soit plus grandiose, avec beaucoup de cordes et de cuivres. Ça s’est naturellement développé ainsi. J’ai aussi gagné en confiance vu que c’était mon deuxième album. Ce que je souhaite, c’est que l’écoute de ma musique soit une expérience édifiante. C’est une musique triste mais pleine d’espoir. Ça parle de surmonter les difficultés, mais surtout du fait qu’il y a une lumière à la fin de tout. Le fait de parler de choses très intimes m’a permis de toucher encore plus de monde. On a atteint un tout autre niveau. On joue devant des arénas de 15 000 personnes. C’est de la folie ! [Ces concerts] are moments of euphoria and communion. It’s amazing to see so many people singing my lyrics, to see that these songs are important to them. […] I still feel like an impostor. I still have the impression that someone will soon come and tell me that it’s over, that I have to go back to work. I feel like this is all a dream!
On the Rivière stage on July 31, 2:40 p.m.