She likes to do things her own way, but Paloma Faith never planned to be a pop star, finds Ian Midgley
IT TAKES a lot of bottle to stand up for what you believe in – especially when doing so could mean the end of all your dreams.
But being true to yourself and sticking to your guns, no matter what, is always the most important thing. Just ask Paloma Faith.
The Cockney-born chanteuse with the big voice and even bigger fashion sense made that clear when she walked out of an all-important audition.
Stood before a big-hitting record label boss, singing her heart out and bearing her soul, she couldn't help notice the man who could make or break her wouldn't stop texting.
Showing more bravado than would seem wise for someone with their future hanging by a thread, she demanded he put his phone down and listen properly. He refused. She walked out.
Not particularly peaceful behaviour for someone whose name translates as Dove in Spanish.
"I said if he had anything to do with my career I'd rather sing in pubs for the rest of my life and walked out," says the 33-year-old Londoner.
Luckily, showing such pluck paid off.
The half-Spanish songstress, who was making ends meet singing in pub bands with occasional work as a magician's assistant – "it was a lot of sitting in boxes with rabbits," she's said – continued to write and record. Eventually the music industry and offending texters had to sit up and take notice.
"Nine months on he wrote me a letter of apology and said he wanted to sign me," says Paloma.
"My view on life is always to ask nicely and politely," she continues. "And if they say no just go and do what you wanted to do anyway."
The rest is history. With three multi-platinum albums under her belt, including this year's A Perfect Contradiction, which stormed straight into number two in the charts, plus a hat-ful of hit singles and some of the biggest names in music – such as mega-producer Pharrell Williams – beating a path to her door, the quirky Cockney has come a long way since flouncing out of auditions.
Despite early ambitions to be a dancer, she studied at The Northern School of Contemporary Dance, in Leeds, and later dreamed of becoming a theatre director, but it seemed written in the stars she would find herself in front of a microphone.
An shy girl growing-up, she admits, the flamboyant fashion and outrageous public persona which have become her calling card are a deliberate effort to become someone else, someone bigger, someone better and someone more confident.
"Singing just sort of chose me in a lot of ways," she says. "I started doing it as a hobby, as a bit of extra money because I enjoyed it.
"I never really thought of myself as a professional singer, but then people started to come to my shows and say 'you're actually really good'. I started to take singing a bit more seriously then.
"I actually trained as a dancer, but then I realised I had made a mistake. Which is fine; everyone makes mistakes."
Her latest venture is a 21-date UK tour which brings her to Hull City Hall, on Halloween, where she'll no doubt be belting out hits like Only Love Can Hurt Like This, Never Tear Us Apart and Picking Up The Pieces.
The title of her latest album, she says, comes from a conversation with Pharrell where they discussed the upbeat nature of the music contrasting with some of the darker meanings behind its lyrics.
"It's got a humour to it and it's uplifting," she said. "Even when its subject matter is sadder than on my last album.
"It's a case of it's all gone to sh*t, let's dance anyway!"'
* Paloma Faith plays Hull City Hall on Friday, October 31. Visit www.palomafaith.com
