Brit winner Emeli Sande on ‘honest’ songwriting
At tonight’s Brit Awards, there’ll be one artist who already knows that she’s won. Singer-songwriter Emeli Sandé has won the Critics’ Choice Award, which is announced in advance. And this weekend her debut album Our Version of Events entered the chart at number one.
We filmed Sandé taking a break from her Brit preparations to meet students from East London – and give them a masterclass on songwriting. Afterwards, she told me, “I try and be as honest as I can in all my songs – any doubts and vulnerabilities I have I just put it all out in the music.
“I haven’t written anything trying to be cool or in trend, it’s just been, ‘Hey I’m at the piano and this song touches me’.
“And I’d just hope they’d make connections with people and it seems to be working.”
We also talked about her “difference” as a human being – and as an artist. She’s spoken in the past about how growing up in Aberdeenshire she often felt like an outsider because she was from the only mixed race family in the area. She also told the students in the masterclass about early experiences she’d had with record company execs who didn’t know what to do with her – or quite how to deal with her difference. But ironically, with her Brit Award and number one album, it’s this very difference which is now being celebrated.
And it’s this difference which I find most interesting about Sandé. Because, looking at the nominations for this year’s Brits, there are plenty of acts whose idiosyncracies might not make them obvious pop stars – at least on the level of image.
Adele, Ed Sheeran and Emeli Sandé could be seen as lacking in the finesse and polish projected by nominees from previous years. The three of them are noticeably low on gimmicks and flash – but high on authenticity and emotional honesty. For many members of the public, their appeal is that they look and sound like real people rather than polished pop stars. Put simply, we like listening to acts like these because they feel like “one of us”.
And the Brit nominations for all three artists are backed up by massive sales. Adele’s album 21 was the world’s biggest seller last year - on both sides of the Atlantic. It’s just spent its 20th week at number one in the US and is expected to sell its 20 millionth copy over the next month. Ed Sheeran’s debut album + has been certified triple platinum in the UK and spawned three – soon to be four – hit singles. While in just one week Our Version of Events by Emeli Sandé has sold over 113,000 copies.
A shift in music taste?
Perhaps what’s happening is that we’ve become over-familiar with the processes behind manufactured pop through the now ubiquitous TV talent shows – and people are hankering after something that feels more organic or “real”.
This desire is particularly pronounced amongst younger listeners who’ve been brought up during what’s now a decade of artificiality; it might also explain why viewing figures for The X Factor were significantly down last year. And why there’s such excitement about the new BBC talent show The Voice, in which contestants audition behind a dark screen, hereby hiding their image from the judges.
Of course, cynics might argue that the authenticity of this new breed of artist is as much a manufactured concoction as the polish of others. And it’s interesting that Emeli Sandé has written songs for TV talent show graduates like Cheryl Cole, Leona Lewis and Cher Lloyd as well as working on her own material. Simon Cowell has even called her his “favourite songwriter of the moment”. Not that this remotely distracts from her own honesty as an artist – but it does demonstrate a certain awareness of the pop machine and show that she’s willing to play the game.
Ultimately for me though, what counts is the experience of the listener. And if listeners in their millions are feeling moved by artists such as Adele, Ed Sheeran and Emeli Sandé – and discovering that they’re not alone in going through certain experiences or emotions – then for this alone those acts should be celebrated.
Let’s hope that this is just what happens at the Brits tonight.
Follow @MatthewCainC4 on Twitter.
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