Sam Fender on New Album ‘People Watching’ and Why Rock Music’s ‘Grassroots Scene Has Been F—ing Decimated’: The Industry Is ‘Inaccessible for Working Class People’

variety.com:

Ellise Shafer Sam Fender‘s third album, “People Watching,” has been a long time coming — and it didn’t come easy. The 30-year-old British musician hit a career high in 2021 after the release of his sophomore record, “Seventeen Going Under,” which catapulted him to mainstream success thanks to its cathartic title track about his rough upbringing in the Northern town of New Shields.

After a whirlwind year supporting the Killers, Rolling Stones and playing to 45,000 people at London’s Finsbury Park, Fender desperately needed a break.

Citing mental health concerns, he canceled the remainder of his U.S. tour for 2022. But that didn’t mean he stopped writing. “We’ve been working on some of the songs for ages, you know?” Fender tells Variety over Zoom on the eve of the album’s release, noting that the band started recording one track, “Wild Long Lie,” three-and-a-half years ago.

In fact, Fender says he had a whole other album essentially finished, but decided to wait it out due to the nature of his deal with Polydor Records. “If you release two within a certain amount of time it only classes as one anyway, so I was like, ‘I’m just going to take my time with it,'” he says. “I think it’s good to not be in people’s faces all the time.