LEWIS Capaldi is truly a man of the Scottish people, brandishing Buckfast at the Brit Awards and expressing concern that, appearing on chat shows with famous guests, he might “smell of piss”.
Introducing a gig, he said: “I’m going to sing some songs, you’re going to listen to them, and then we’re all going to f*** off.” Preferably to “get steaming”. Sounds like a plan.
Described by the NME as a “likeable Scottish pop don”, and praised by the Guardian for his “self-deprecating wit”, with his messy hair and goofy mien, he’s not your average-looking pop star. He has described himself as a “melting hippo”.
But, boy, when he opens that big maw of his can, hear him huskily belt out sad songs of romantic disaster, in a voice described as having “more gravel than a branch of B&Q”.
He first yelled out on October 7, 1996 when he was born in Glasgow, where he lived until the age of four, when his family moved to East Whitburn in West Lothian. His ancestry is Scottish, Irish and Italian.
The Irish stems from Donegal, original home of his great-grandmother. He believes his mother met his father, of Italian descent, because “Irish people love ice cream”.
He first sang on stage at the age of four during a family trip to France. The song? We Are The Champions by Queen. Natch. Went down a storm.
Aged nine, Lewis learned guitar and soon began writing songs, with his eldest brother later sneaking him into pubs to play gigs. After uploading an iPhone recording to SoundCloud, he attracted the attention of pop manager Ryan Walter, who flew from America to hear the 18-year-old play.
Capaldi’s first single, Bruises, was released independently in 2017, earning 28 million plays on Spotify, making him the fastest-ever unsigned artist to reach such a number.
The song was later re-released as a single in 2019, reaching six in the singles chart. Meanwhile, Capaldi was signed to Universal Music Group, with his songs distributed in the UK by Virgin EMI and in the US by Capitol.
Loved by the public
After several support act gigs, Lewis headlined his own tour of the UK and Europe in 2018 before releasing breakthrough single Someone You Loved. Recently revealed as the most popular break-up song of recent times, it charted in 29 countries, staying at number one in the UK for seven weeks.
On hearing it had reached top spot, Lewis ordered two half-pints of Heineken to his Bordeaux hotel room before celebrating at a bowling alley where the champagne was “bleak”. When Someone reached number one on the Billboard Hot 100, Lewis became the first Scottish solo artist to top the US charts since Sheena Easton in 1981. By May 2020, it had become the longest-running top 10 UK single of all time by a British artist.
Debut album Divinely Uninspired To a Hellish Extent (great proggy-sounding title!) became the biggest selling album in the UK in five years, spending five weeks at number one. In the summer of 2019, Capaldi performed at several festivals, including Glastonbury, and was the support for his friend Edward Sheeran, playing four gigs with him in Ipswich and Leeds.
Lewis himself became the first artist to sell out an arena tour before the release of an album. The shows sold out in one second. This, in even his own view, was getting out of hand.
Pizza the action
WITH fame comes flat, round dough, and Lewis’s Big Sexy Pizza range became available in Iceland and Tesco. Topping stuff. Capaldi’s second long player, Broken By Desire To Be Heavenly Sent (a title that could easily belong to Yes or King Crimson) became the fastest-selling album of 2023.
After two more number one singles, Pointless and Wish You The Best, in June 2023, Capaldi announced an extended break to focus on his mental and physical health. Earlier that month, at Glastonbury, he’d suffered an apparent episode of Tourette’s syndrome before losing his voice. He finished the set with the support of his loving fans.
Prior to this, for some time he’d spoken of performance anxiety and nervous tics. During the Covid pandemic, he’d moved back to his parents’ house in Whitburn to work on his second album.
Lewis also suffers from self-effacing Scottish pessimism, believing “the backlash is coming soon”. Even in 2020, he was predicting that “things are going to go downhill”.
Even if they did, which seems unlikely, he could surely look back with pleasure on his spat with Oasis star Noel Gallagher as a highpoint of his life.
Gallagher started it, opining of Divinely Unexpired etc becoming number one: “Music is f****** w*** at the moment.”
He added: “Who’s this Capaldi fella? Who the f***’s that idiot?”
Capaldi responded: “F****** peaked – slagged off by Noel Gallagher! … This is dreams coming true.”
He then wished Gallagher a happy Father’s Day and filmed himself enjoying Oasis hit Stop Crying Your Heart Out.
Noel retorted by mocking Someone You Loved alongside a clip of his young son pretending to cry, captioning it: “@LewisCapaldi you big daftie.
“You might wanna try and find some joy in your tunes, you’re destroying the youth… my 11yr old is in bits.”
The tit-for-tat spat continued at Glastonbury, with Lewis unzipping an Oasis-stye parka to reveal a top adorned with Noel’s face inside a love heart.
Tat followed tit, with Noel declaring: “F****** Chewbacca should enjoy his 15 minutes. The greatest day of his life that I slagged him off or called him an idiot.”
Circumspectly, he added: Well, I know you’re Scottish and all that but f****** hell. It is like a third world country…”
Oasis of calm
PROUD Britons everywhere rejoiced as Lewis changed his Twitter name to Chewis Capaldi – I see – and edited his face onto the Star Wars character’s heid. Both parties were clearly enjoying this, with Noel later admitting that Lewis was a “good lad”.
And he is. His clever, self-effacing humour sets him apart from other stars, with record labels reportedly telling their artists “to be more like Lewis Capaldi”.
He has described becoming famous as “mad… like this is happening to someone else, and I’m just watching it”.
Speaking to Dork magazine in 2019, he said: “[I]f you realise that… this is all f****** ridiculous, then you’re in good stead, I reckon. As soon as it becomes normal then you’re in trouble.”
Robert McNeil is an investigative journalist specialising in turnip theft from allotments. His Scottish erotic memoir, Hand Me Doon Ma Prophylactics, is being made into a cartoon by Disney Studios.
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