So, in your eyes, have you done any wrong? Um...

i was put in a hard place is the best best way to explain it so basically um these people are obviously above me like i don't contact the venues you know per se and do all that uh these teams that do that and obviously like i want my shows to be inclusive for everyone from every side every part of the globe everyone enjoying it and obviously like um with what they said and me trying to keep out of personal politics myself might do the odd song about it but um basically it's a bit of a hard one because obviously if they say no and if it was me personally i'd be like all right if that's you your rules you know fair play yeah but obviously

So, would you say he's big in it?

I don't know, you know, like, I mean, I played at his wedding.

And...

I just think that it's all got too far in a way.

His complete passion for free Palestine has engulfed him almost.

Do you know what I mean? Instead of going, look, we got that, and then that's that.

I mean, I guess you could be younger, but not barely.

Yeah, it's a weird one, because I do look back on it, and there are certain things that I didn't experience, but also, like...

It's all I ever wanted to do.

So, like, could I have deferred everything and done all the experience things till I was 22 and then done it? And would that have, like, been better? And I don't think it would have done.

What experience is popping into your head? University? I mean, that maybe.

Yeah.

I mean, but not universities and studying, but the experience of being at university with other kids.

I

so globally locked in unlike any other album you've done what made you want to go around the world i mean it's like we had to have a passport to listen to your album

and i love that yeah well i always tour and when i tour i spend loads of time in the cities that i tour i've been to india like loads of times met lots of people there and i think like aziz am like Ilya, the producer I worked with on that was Persian.

I love that song.

Everywhere I go, like around the world, I just get fist bumps from Persians.

That's so cool.

Or just quiet fist bumps in the street.

Do you like Indian people? Yeah.

As you're about to say to us as well.

Mm.

But I think in the conversation of what gets played on...

the news when I die, I think it's Sapphire or I think it's something like Azizam.

I think more, more Sapphire, and I think because of the y- like, the feeling that I get when I meet, uh, people from the Indian diaspora in the UK or in America or in Canada, or even when I'm in India shooting that video and people are kind of like, "Do you know what this is and what this means?" And I think that, uh, the fusion of the two, I didn't really realize it whilst I was making it at the time, but it feels super important and I love how it's been taken.

And when I was in India, they're very much like Arijit is, uh, are their, their version of me for the, the UK in terms of, like, love songs, singer-songwriter, vocal, blah, blah, blah.

So I think the, the meeting of the worlds was, uh, it kind of was almost inevitable, but I think that it, it made the song what it is.

So I think for me it, for, for me it's definitely the most important song on the record, and I do think that it, it will stand the test of time in terms of, um, fusing Western pop culture with, um, with, uh, Indian in a respectful way, I think.

Yeah.

"It's dead to me."

No, she's just got a very good taste and read on things.

Like even, I would write, I'd say, three songs a day, five days a week, and I'll come home, and I'll play, play them, and she can sift through that pretty easily.

So like, when Bad Habits was written, I'd written a bunch of other songs that day, and I remember I came home, I listened to them all, all in the car, and I was kind of excited about most of them, and I played them to her, and she was like, "That one, that Bad Habits one, that's the one you should finish tomorrow." And then, I'm like, "Okay." And then you go in and finish it, and she's the same with Shivers, the same with, um...

Which one on this record? Sapphire, she loved.

Azazam, she loved.

Like, yeah, she's got, she's got a very good read on stuff.

Is there a duet that you have done that has stood out to you as your favorite or one of your favorites?

Do you think you handle being in the public eye well?

I, this has been my life since I was 19 so I think that the first five years, six years of my life, no, um, I really didn't and I really struggled with it.

Uh, relationships wise, not just romantic but just relationships in my life, friendships, family, ev- everything like it just everything shifted.

And I know people go, um, you know, "When someone becomes famous they change, they dis..." But genuinely I didn't for the first three years.

I was, I was exactly the same person and everyone around me changed just in their way of treating me or acting or talking or like leaking things or doing this or doing this.

And then, and then you start changing and you become a paranoid fucker and then it all starts sort of like shifting.

So I think at the beginning it's that transitional period where you're just trying to work out...... how, who you are and whether I am my stage name, and that's me the whole time, and I'm pop star, and I'm, I'm this.

And then look where you are.

Here's Ed Sheeran.

Because I've got mates who are fans of the big six.

If they win, it's like, "Yeah, cool, we won," and if they lose, it's like the world's ended.

But being an Ipswich fan, like, we never expect to win.

(laughs)

When we're in League One, we're in the Championship, we're in the Prem, we don't expect to win.

We go because we love it.

So when someone scores, that feeling is so electric and amazing and it's so, like, it just lifts you.

(laughs)

... s- sort of places.

But, um, I, I don't know, we're, we're quite a sort of close-knit community.

I think this is why I love being an Ipswich fan and why I was drawn back because I, I sort of had a point in my life where I drifted.

Like I was a, I was an Ipswich fan up until probably about the age of 10 or 11 and then I picked up with a guitar and didn't care about anything else, like at all, so I was just pure music, music, music, guitar.

Didn't even watch movies, TV shows, football.

I was just completely...... c- c- centered and focused on music.

Have you experienced the change?