X Factor winner James Arthur reveals how close drug binges and paranoia almost led to taking his own life
The singer talks to us about his suicidal thoughts and putting his life back together
FOUR years after he won The X Factor, James Arthur still has the biggest-selling winner’s single in the history of the show.
His smash hit Impossible spent three weeks at No1 and was downloaded an incredible three million times.
The success of the single only backed up the plaudits he received on his way to victory, with glowing tributes from Ed Sheeran, Rita Ora and his show mentor and biggest fan, Nicole Scherzinger.
This was the man who would finally provide The X Factor with its first credible artist.
But, nearly 18 months later, the Middlesbrough-born singer self-destructed in a blitz of social media ramblings resulting in him losing his record deal — and nearly his life.
Here, giving his first newspaper interview in two-and-half years, James tells The Sun how close he was to ending it all.
He said: “I genuinely was at the end of my tether.
“I’d never been a guy who suffers from suicidal tendencies but I had taken all I could take from life.
“I thought that was my chance and I’d ruined it. You never see an X Factor winner make a comeback. It doesn’t happen.”
James, 28, is now trying to do just that, rebuilding his career after a break from the UK spotlight.
He claims the insecurities and paranoia which contributed to his downfall have gone, and so has the ego.
James said: “I got lost in the whole fame thing.
“When there’s no expectation, you still have that paranoia, but when it’s on a scale where everyone is talking about you it’s magnified and I lost my mind, basically. I cracked.
I don’t have prejudices against anybody
“I saw all these past X Factor winners and thought, ‘Why do they never do anything? I’ve got to make a stamp here. If I’m going to do this, I want to be great.’
“It manifested some way that with all the other sh*t I was doing, I ended up becoming a control freak and being bitter when I saw any negativity.
“I got into a lot of feuds with people. You can say I’m an ugly c***, but you can’t say I’m bad at music.
“So when I saw those things, for some reason I’d bite back at it.
“It’s weird looking back because I don’t need people’s validation.”
The cracks started to appear in March 2013 when unflattering stories about James’ love life were made public, including one story in which he wooed a beauty therapist he met on Twitter with a £5 bottle of wine bought from a garage.
Out of character pops at One Direction, the darlings of his Syco label, followed. He described them as a “marketing product” and sarcastically claimed he had posters of Louis Tomlinson “all over my walls.”
He even laid into pop darling Rita — who he was once romantically linked with — while rapping on BBC Radio 1Xtra.
In December, a year after he won The X Factor, he returned to the show and apologised live on stage for “abusing my position as an X Factor winner” and vowed to move on.
But just two months later, his biggest controversy hit and he was branded homophobic for calling unknown rapper Micky Worthless a “f****** queer” during a rap battle aired on Radio 1 DJ Charlie Sloth’s show, sparking an outpouring of criticism on social media.
James insists the term was taken out of context, but is still frustrated gay X Factor contestant Lucy Spraggan and Little Britain funnyman Matt Lucas got involved, helping to swing public opinion against him.
He said: “I hate it that that’s part of my reputation. I accept people for what they are. I’m not the most conventional person.
“It is the one thing that upsets me.
“People were jumping on it to get a bit of press, further kicking me when I was down.
“That really upset me. You can say what you want about me but I don’t have any prejudices towards anybody.
“I hate bullying. I hate all that kind of stuff. It’s disgusting. It’s a shame that the average guy on the street might think that about me.
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““I’m not homophobic — I lived with Rylan (Clark-Neal) during The X Factor and I saw his d*** more than my own.” Two months later, in March 2014, he was gone — Syco boss Simon Cowell had dropped him from the label.
The X Factor champ had ended up just like every other male winner — Steve Brookstein, Shayne Ward, Leon Jackson, Joe McElderry and Matt Cardle — on the pop scrapheap.
But this was all his doing, it wasn’t down to sales.
His self-titled debut album sold more than 400,000 copies, with only global superstar Eminem keeping
him off the top of the charts.
He was also nominated for a Brit Award, and named Best Newcomer in equivalent award shows in France and Germany.
With no record deal, public support at an all-time low and an increasing dependence in marijuana and prescription pills to treat depression, James hit rock bottom.
He said: “My lowest moment was when I was going to bed, I’d take 15 pre-rolled joints and smoke one after the other, popping anti-depressants. My head was an absolute mess.”
James claims he was so “wired” he even had an “upside down cross” tattooed on his face.
Quitting drugs has helped me get perspective
The hatred towards him got so bad even his own father was attacked on the street in his home town of Middlesborough — mirroring an unprovoked attack he had himself endured.
But, with the whole of the UK seemingly against him, his European fanbase remained strong.
Indeed, James continued to play to huge audiences at some of the continent’s biggest music festivals, giving him the encouragement to relaunch his career.
He said: “I was doing a lot of gigs in Europe. Germany has been great for me, like Poland and Portugal.
“It’s what really kept me going. When people in the UK wrote me off, I’d headline a festival in Portugal and play to 70,000 people and I’d have 70,000 people singing my songs back at me.
“It was weird as I’d go away and be this big superstar.”
Such was the size of his following in Europe, record labels began to circle and he was finally signed by Sony Germany last September — sparking his big comeback.
He kicked the drugs and returned to the studio, this time being given more creative control compared to his time at Syco.
Now, more than two years on from being dropped by Simon Cowell, the pair have made peace and yesterday James released the first single Say You Won’t Let Go from his second album, Back From The Edge.
Speaking about his new music, he said: “Quitting drugs has helped me gain some perspective. I don’t recognise that artist in my first album.
“A couple of songs are great, but I was writing for other people then.
“I was trying to write a hit, trying to be the best X Factor winner ever — they weren’t honest songs as you didn’t hear any of my character.
“This one, there’s loads of me in it. There is a bit of self-indulgence in there as I had to tell my story.
People will relate to it and the message is hope, love and respect, to like yourself.”
And one thing is for sure, if there’s any negative feedback, the one-time angriest man on Twitter won’t bite back.
He said: “This time I’ll laugh it off.”
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