PALOMA

Paloma Faith’s comeback single, How You Leave a Man, is a zero-tolerance barn-burner about not sticking with the monotony and neglect of domesticity. Instead, the British pop superstar suggests packing your bags, emptying the bank account and driving off into the sunset, ideally soundtracked by epic violins and a distorted guitar solo. “Remember what I told ya,” she sings, her voice towering and severe: “This is how you leave a man.”

End scene, happiness guaranteed… right? Not quite. The clean break of How You Leave a Man is a fantasy in many ways, one that Paloma knows the brutal reality of well. Since she released her last album, the silver-certified Infinite Things, in 2020, she split from her partner of nine years and father to her two children. If her acclaimed 2021 BBC documentary As I Am showed the brutal realities of being a mother and a pop star, the challenges of being a single mother and a pop star (not to mention also a lauded actor and homewares designer) are even starker. The “coparenting” that still puts all the mental load on the mother. The public’s assumption that the split must be her fault, or that she should have tolerated misery for the sake of her kids. The realisation that just because you leave in search of greater happiness doesn’t mean you’ll find it quickly, or even ever.

Paloma’s ferocious sixth album, The Glorification of Sadness, is an epic, expansive, deeply personal record that turns over these feelings by taking a chronological journey through the cracking of an adult relationship, and with it a family. There are no conclusions, just empathetic questions from an artist obsessed with interrogating the status quo and upending assumptions. (Plus one petulant rager called, brilliantly, Eat Shit and Die.) After she completed Infinite Things by learning how to self-produce in her basement during the pandemic, Paloma is billed here as executive producer, having meticulously tweaked mixes, orchestrated the writing teams and co curated the album’s visual world. The documentary showed her previous creative struggles with her label; this time, she made the record privately, inspired by her earliest musical experiences in a rock band, and delivered the completed product, to the surprise of her team. “It sounds how I wanted it to sound,” she says. “My note, most of the time, was either ‘angrier’ or ‘darker’.”

Despite Paloma’s clear creative directive, the album’s title sums up her ambivalence about a culture in which “there’s quite a sick and twisted call for any artist to turn the most awful things that happened to them into a commodity,” she says. “It’s a strange idea, to sell your own grieving process. Writing about it was a therapeutic experience for me but at the same time now that I’m left with this object for sale, it is a bit sinister.” She felt she had no choice but to write about her experiences “because it’s all I think about”. Compelled by the nuanced television adaptation of Ingmar Bergman’s Scenes From a Marriage, Paloma also wanted to counter the prevailing societal concept of victims and villains in the breakdown of a relationship. “How to Leave a Man is meant to be empowering,” she says. “It’s about taking control and responsibility for your own happiness as a woman. And not listening to the din of social pressures saying: you’re only accepted as a woman if you’re a victim. There’s no room for a woman to say: actually, I just wasn’t really happy. It’s not really seen as acceptable, especially when there’s kids involved. You’re just a bad mother, selfish or whatever. So in this album, I’m trying to pull it in the direction of it being OK to take ownership of your own happiness and not be a victim. Re-establishing ideas of how we demonise women.”

The striking video, conceived by Paloma and creative director Theo Adams, shows a provocative, vampedup version of her walking out on an unseen man then “decadently sprawling all over the car bonnet”, she says. “Then I land back in the driver’s seat and the camera pans across to two children sitting in the back, and they say: ‘Can we go home now, mummy?’ I’m trying to make this big statement about women that’s so complex, words don’t even do it justice.” Throughout the album’s visuals, no man is ever seen. “The overarching theme is about a woman’s personal internal journey and experience of life,” she says. “Quite often people make breakups about two individuals: what was his side? But in a psychological sense it’s not really ever about who did and said what because you can survive anything if you choose to, maybe you just choose not to.”

In recent years, Paloma has become a lifeline for many women who find solace in her unadulterated honesty as she shares her candid experiences of birth, babies, postnatal depression and the challenges of having your basic needs met as a woman and mother expected to sacrifice herself over everyone else. When she was younger, she admits, she wanted to “achieve global success on a large scale, like Adele or Beyoncé. I’m really happy with what I’ve got now because it’s allowed me to make a work-life balance for my children, and while I get recognised, I have people approaching me in a really nice way because they’ve seen stuff I’ve said and they want to speak candidly and intelligently about those subjects. Particularly after the documentary I had a lot of women approaching me in the street, and sometimes they get quite emotional.”

Paloma is in the final stages of writing a book about her experiences as well and her aims for the feminist movement. Sharing her life, she says, is about several things: it helps her, it helps others, it raises awareness about the reality of women’s lives. “It makes me feel less alone,” she admits. “We live in this very separate society now because of the internet, dating apps, Chat GPT, the illusion of community online. How many times do we actually truly engage with each other? It adds another wall between us. Friends I’ve had for 20 years have said to me recently: why don’t you just call us when you’re not feeling good? And I don’t know how to. I’ve forgotten how to.”

That’s a theme that runs across The Glorification of Sadness: that brokenness is a facet of humanity to be celebrated and interrogated, not smoothed over by technology that only further divides us. It’s been an existential period for Paloma, who mounted her 2022 tour in the wake of the end of her relationship and the deaths of five friends, including her beloved bandmate BB Bones. “All that makes you go inside yourself,” she says. “I think a lot of people had the same experiences post-pandemic. I didn’t feel that during the pandemic I was that affected by it. But afterwards I think we realised that we were. We’re in the middle of a depression historically where lots of things feel unstable. Environmental issues, political issues, community-based issues, there’s less money for everything. It’s all imbalanced.”

The suggestion that we could build a better society in the pandemic’s wake didn’t come to pass, she says, creating a wave of resentment that the government conveniently directs towards marginalised groups such as refugees and trans people. “A lot of the anger is so misdirected – what’s the problem if someone wants to transition? Leave them alone. If you’re angry with your own life, fine, but it’s not really any of your business. People don’t like anyone who makes them think they’re maybe partly to blame for their own unhappiness because they’re too scared to do anything about it, so they’re just going to hate anyone who takes responsibility for theirs.”

Paloma’s ability to marry lavish, skyscraping pop fantasy with funny, plainspoken practicality is key to why she’s become one of the most successful British pop stars of her generation, with four platinumcertified albums (three of them double platinum) to her name and five Top 10 singles. “I’m a female artist that began at a time where female artists’ careers didn’t really last,” she says. “There’s very few of my original female peers that still have a career.” Paloma mentions two recent mirrors to her attitude towards longevity: Doja Cat’s victorious new track Demons, and Madonna’s declaration: “The most controversial thing I’ve ever done is to stick around.” Paloma cried when she came across it. “I just found it so unbelievably moving. I felt seen”.

Paloma has stuck around – and stuck to her guns. Earlier this year, she visited Ukrainian refugees in Poland to learn about the experiences of young mothers fleeing the war. And when she performed at King Charles’ coronation concert in May, she thought carefully about how to do it in an authentic way. “I’ve come up through the British system, the NHS, state schooling,” she says. “I think it’s important that working-class people like me are represented in those situations. And I was helped by Charles’ Prince’s Trust charity when I was a kid because I was from a lowincome household, so it felt respectful to do it. A large part of opportunity for underprivileged artists and creatives has come from that charity, which is really important – otherwise all creativity would be ruled by people from privileged backgrounds.”

To the preshow she wore a Vivienne Westwood T-shirt emblazoned with “CLIMATE” to foreground the environmental crisis and acknowledge Charles’ work on environmentalism. “I feel when you’re given an opportunity, you should take it because otherwise change doesn’t happen,” says Paloma. It could be her life MO. After all, every reality starts as a fantasy.

Paloma Faith is back with her 6th Album ‘The Glorification Of Sadness’, it’s been almost 4 years since her last release. We had the pleasure of chatting about new music, festivals, touring, love of cinema and so much more.

Before we chat music and your new album, I wanted to pick your brain on a few other things

I’m addicted to the movies and go at least once a week and It’s no secret you are a real movie buff. Is there a certain genre you are drawn to and what is the most recent movie you’ve seen ?

I think it is thought provoking and really creative stories. But at the moment it is Oscar season so I have just seen three amazing films in the space of 10 days. I’ve seen ‘Poor Things’, ‘American Fiction’ and ‘The Holdovers’.

I absolutely loved ‘Poor Things’, actually I really enjoyed all three of them for different reasons. ‘Poor Things’ is probably one of the most perfect films I have seen in a decade, because it is just so detailed.

We’ve seen you act in Dangerous Liaisons and Pennywise, any other projects in the pipeline?

Acting wise no - not at the moment because I have got this album coming out and then I have got a book coming out in the Summer, so my acting agent said she is not putting me up for anything at the minute.

I watched your TikTok promo video which I thought was so hilarious, do you enjoy engaging with your audience via the platform? There was a video posted about a week ago and you were talking about your new album and I just laughed the whole way through itwith your different characters and American accent.

That’s the QVC advert. Actually I have a friend that sometimes makes videos with me and he is quite good at it. He is also a musician.

You are so creative, a lover of fashion and interiors, do your fashion choices inspire your Palmona Home products and collections?

My house is basically - every room is like an outfit! I don’t think they inspire each other. I think that is just what I am like. I am very much a person who likes a lot of tat.

I read you have a book coming out called MILF - what can you tell us about it and when can we get it? It is mainly just about female identity, I guess in what they call ‘middle age’, but I don’t feel ’middle-aged’, so it is sort of two fingers up to that!

OK LET’S GET INTO THE NEW ALBUM - ‘The Glorification Of Sadness’

OMG it is so so good, I’ve been listening to it all week. This is your first time working with Producer Martin Wave - how was the experience?

It was amazing and we worked really well together. He is very open-minded as well about my whimsical and experimental ideas. I feel that I was really fortunate to have worked with him. Working as the Executive Producer and breathing down his neck the whole time, I can say that this is an album that I am quite proud of. I like the sound of this album. In the past I have had certain production issues with previous albums on some of the songs, but I can say with this one it is exactly how I wanted it to be.

You collaborated with so many people on this album, including Charlie Puth, is everything now pre arranged and decided upon or do you get the chance to be in the same room with people and create?

I still get the opportunity to create. This album was like a sort of post-lockdown and everyone was like we can all go back into the studio together which is great.

I think during lockdown everyone felt really isolated and it felt like the worst thing that had ever happened to me.

Bar the 3 released tracks , my personal favourites have to be ‘God In A Dress’ and ‘Divorce’ - is there 1 song that you are drawn to more than others?

I think ‘Divorce’ is the most harrowing one for me to sing and listen to and it is definitely the saddest.

The next few months are going to be bonkers for you, touring Europe, U.K, doing festivals, though elephant in the room - no Belfast date ? Tut tut tut, can we expect any?

Honestly, I would travel the world if I had the opportunity to but every time I ask why they say it is to do with numbers, we just have to go to increase demand in those territories before you can go and play in them.

I am probably more gutted than you actually because it is my life and my career and I was like, “Why not even N.I???”

Is there anywhere in particular you are most looking forward to playing?

Well, I am going to Ivy Gardens which I am excited about. I also absolutely love playing in Scotlandthere is a similarity between the audiences in Ireland and Scotland - I think that is why they are my favourite territories. People really know how to have a good time at those shows.

The U.K leg of the tour has 26 dates though 15 are already SOLD OUT, that is incredible.

Yes but I am one of those people saying “why aren’t they all sold out” , I really am chuffed though from the response even prior to my new album being released.

This album is all about finding yourself and empowerment, any advice for our readers struggling with their identities/sexuality?

I think it is a difficult time actually particularly for the LGBTQ+ community because we have such an ignorant and disgusting Prime Minister. I actually feel embarrassed at the moment. So I understand why people are maybe feeling even more upset about their sexual identity or their gender identity. I am very much my authentic self and I believe that everyone has the right to be their authentic self and to be praised, loved and celebrated for it. Even though it feels sometimes you are not, with life experience as well for different reasons, it is like if you are your authentic self sometimes you have to be ahead of everyone else and then eventually they catch up.

It is disgusting and embarrassing what is happening at the minute.

I totally agree, it is just a sad state of affairs that is being brought up within the government?

Well, he (the PM), just thinks that it’s like an open forum for him to make a joke, which is disgusting and reflects on everything to me. It just makes me think that he is a hideous human being across the board. How can we have someone making any decisions for our country when he has got views like that or he thinks that those things are trivial, which they are not.

Lastly, let’s end with a positive high, describe your album in 3 words to entice people to buy it?

Three words - Euphoria, empowerment and acceptance!

Thanks for taking the time to chat Paloma

Interview with Daniel May

Paloma’s new album ‘The Glorification Of Sadness’ is OUT NOW! You can purchase via this link palomafaith.com, you’ll also find all her upcoming concert dates, music and much more