I have always loved music and never really cared about anything else. But at the time, it was not  a career path I thought I could take. Where I am from, there is no money, so it felt like felt like in order to be in the music world you had to know somebody. I used to produce exclusively in my bedroom by plugging my guitar into my laptop—absolutely cowboying everything I did in a really shit way. After moving to London, I moved out of the bedroom and into a studio. It’s been a bit of a jump between my EPs and album, but I feel l my production is way better, well, I fucking hope so.

Glasgow is a very colorful place with no bullshit. It was known as this vacuum of hyper masculine violence when I was growing up, but I think that people forget to mention that there is a massive sense of community and love in Glasgow. This has definitely affected my music in terms of being honest. When I listen to artists, I want to believe what they are saying. In Glasgow, you have to be yourself or nothing else, which is reflected in the way I write. 

It was always the plan. I had the drive to share my music with people. Luckily I had the support of my managers, who would tell me if something was shit or not. When it got to the time that I started kicking the ball, it was a bit scary because, when you write stuff in your bedroom, you feel like nobody is going to hear it. You admit things to yourself that you would never admit to a room of strangers.

Music is such a visceral experience, it’s like when you smell the aftershave of someone you used to be with—it teleports you back. When performing my songs every night, I learn to deal with reliving past experiences.The idea of heartbreak really interests me—it’s a universal mundane feeling that makes people so creative. For me, it’s important to deliver the feelings of heartbreak in an uplifting way. I was brought up on Motown watching glamorous women dancing with their hair done up and singing about men who had wronged them. I have always been attracted to that sentiment of happy-sad and the juxtaposition of these emotions.

The album charts the beginning, middle, and ending story of my past relationship and how it affected me indefinitely. It was called something else for a long time, and I never really liked the working title. I was at a party and there were loads of cigarette packets everywhere, with the phrase ‘smoking causes permanent damage’. The phrase had a ring to it, and I think when I saw it, it summed up the album’s theme for me.

My Woman by Angel Olson. She uses her voice to make you feel how she wants you to feel. It’s fucking mad how she changes it all the time. I also love the production of it. When I broke up with my ex, I would close the curtains, turn the TV off and listen to the entire album.

Carole King, Tapestry. I love the texture of the album. I feel like when I heard ‘It’s Too late’, I was transported to sitting in bed in the morning with a partner, feeling like something has changed. I feel like that is such a needlepoint precision description of how it feels when you know it’s over, but you’re still with them.

It’s a list of tracks that I have been listening to either forever or for the last few weeks. It changes all the time. Honestly, give me a brief, and I can make you a playlist. I’ve got a playlist for every mood or setting: cooking, I can’t be arsed or getting off my face. There truly is a playlist for every mood.