From the role LGBT politics plays in defining masculinity to the male mental-health crisis, the Years & Years frontman and reigning GQ Live Act Of The Year has given voice to people for whom silence can be an all-consuming - sometimes even fatal - burden. Here, he speaks of his battles with depression, self-harm and homophobia and asks if more gay musicians should write openly about love
I have to admit, as a 61-year-old writer and political strategist, the music of Olly Alexander – the 28-year-old gay, flamboyant frontman of Years & Years – had passed me by. My first sighting of him came when he skipped to the stage to collect his GQ Men Of The Year award and instead of the usual thanks to agents and parents and pet parrots, he delivered a superb and passionate plea to think differently about masculinity, mixed with what I sensed was a real understanding of the need to change attitudes on mental health. I saw beyond the feathered outfit and the crimson hair and heard a real voice. Then I started listening to his singing voice, and I liked it. And then I watched his BBC Three documentary, Growing Up Gay. If you haven’t seen it, I recommend you do. So I was looking forward to seeing whether – in a face-to-face chat – he would live up to the expectation I had developed that he was warm, likeable, open, bright, deep, funny, a bit wacky and sometimes very, very down. He met them all, and more. What a lovely guy. What a talent. What more could I want from an interview? He was even the first ever interviewee to compliment me on my dress sense...
Alastair Campbell: So I went off and I listened to your music. Like! I then read loads of your interviews and we have a shared interest in mental health. Like! And then I watched your BBC documentary, Growing Up Gay, which I thought was amazing.
Olly Alexander: Aw, thanks. Thank you.
I grade my mental health every day when I wake up. One: I can conquer the world. Ten: I want to top myself. Where did you wake up today?
I woke up feeling quite good today. I actually saw my therapist this morning, so I said, “I’m going to be meeting Alastair Campbell today for an interview and we are probably going to be talking about mental health. Isn’t that interesting?” So I feel good.
And what’s the worst?
I would have definitely said ten at certain times.
What does that feel like for you?
Like life isn’t worth living. You don’t see any hope or positivity, just having such low self-worth that you feel like everything’s meaningless.
And how do you equate having low self-worth with the fact that you can go on stage and people go crazy and you can make a song and squillions of people want to hear it?
Well, that has helped my self-worth actually, but at the same time you divorce yourself from the character that you have on stage. The adoration from fans feels like it’s directed at someone who’s not you.
Do you take medication every day?
What are you taking?
Ditto! [Shake hands.] I’ve been on it for four years now. I think I’m addicted to it. I really worry about coming off it.
Yeah, because you think “I don’t want to be addicted to something,” but I had a conversation with a psychiatrist and she said if you had a thyroid problem you’d be taking medication your entire life, so maybe this is just something you need to take for a long time. She got me to try to think about it in a different way.
'I’m still working on those anger issues. But that’s the big one isn’t it, anger at your parents?'
Would you worry if you were on it forever?
There is a part of me that feels a bit ashamed [if] I couldn’t cope without it. But then another part of me goes, “If this is the way I can best live my life and I can feel that I’m not getting overwhelmed or I don’t want to top myself then it’s a good thing.”
That’s where I am, totally. Of all the things that you’ve talked about – depression, anxiety, bulimia, hallucinations and self-harm – put those in a league table of horror. Which are the worst?
Oh, God. Well, they’re all linked. I think back to the times when each was most present. When I was 14 and I was cutting myself and when I was 16 I was bulimic and that lasted for seven years. My mental health was manifesting in these different ways. For instance, self-harming.
Was that cutting yourself? A razor?
What are you thinking as you are actually doing that? Is it pain that is coming out?
If you feel completely overwhelmed by life, if you can’t control your emotions or everything feels like too much, if you can have control of your body or over a sensation of pain that feels like it’s reaffirming your existence in a way... It makes you feel alive when you harm yourself. I had no idea why I was cutting myself, really. And it was deeply shameful. I was hiding it.
I know we always try to make obvious easy links, but was that just after your father had left you?
Yes. And like you say it is easy to make links when you look back. Also, I was at that age, 13 or 14, when everybody struggles. But, yeah, my dad left and that was sort of a family implosion or explosion.
On coming out, you never felt able to do that to your mum until much, much later.
Yeah. And that wasn’t because I felt she wouldn’t accept it, more I didn’t feel like I could. Nobody was out, nobody had the language even to discuss desire, or [the idea] that maybe I might not be straight. It just didn’t feel like we could communicate in that way and we have to go on our own journeys to be able to.
You got bullied for several years. What was the worst encounter?
I really hated sports at school, like a lot of kids. We were playing rugby and obviously I was completely terrible, but I scored a try, the first time I’d ever done anything good in PE and the two big lads, popular boys, were walking back to the changing rooms afterwards and they had their arms around me and said, “Well done. I’m really proud of you! You scored a try,” and I said, “Thanks guys,” and then they tripped me up and pushed my face into the mud and laughed at me. I remember that being quite a low.
And your dad. Have you not seen him at all since?
I have seen him a couple of times.
‘Homophobia is also linked to ideas about gender and masculinity’
Because he got in touch with you through social media. Was that not a bit weird too?
Yeah. It was weird. Eventually I just thought it was about time we meet face to face. And I realise how frozen in time my perception is of this man as my dad, because there’s a whole 15-year gap. He’s now older and a bit fat and his accent is different. I don’t know him! We don’t know each other. Our interactions just felt very alien, like this is someone who’s not part of my life and hasn’t been for a very long time.
Do you feel angry with him?
Well I’m still working on those anger issues. But that’s the big one isn’t it, anger at your parents?
Well, especially if they’ve done bad to you.
Yeah, I’m still working on it.
You’re not forgiving him?
Maybe I haven’t. But I guess there’s no rule book, is there? Of how you’re supposed to have that relationship with your parents, especially when you have a fractured one.
And is there a part of you that thought he was getting in touch with you because you’ve become famous?
Yeah. Yeah. That’s a big part.
It wasn’t like, “I want to make up with my son”?
It didn’t really feel that way, no.
If you look at your mental health issues, where would you balance the stuff with your dad, the bullying and the difficulties of growing up thinking you might be gay?
I don’t know. I couldn’t really say the scales tip one way or the other but it was a set of circumstances. I’ve kept diaries since I was 13...
Do you think you are going to publish them one day?
Well maybe after I die someone can go through them and do a posthumous edition... So, I noticed that the summer holidays, I’m 13, something happens, the whole tone changes.
It is just quite uncomfortable reading. Who knows?
When were you first aware that the concept of being gay existed?
We used to go camping to the Isle Of Wight. We had a portable black-and-white TV. And there was a TV show on at the time and it had some gay characters on it and something gay was happening at the time. And it was me, my mum and dad and my brother. We were watching it and I remember it being a bit like something naughty was happening. I asked my mum what was happening and she said, “Oh, it’s just gays... gays having fun!” and I remember thinking “Oh, so gay people have fun!” I was hyper aware of any gay character, any gay storyline in anything. Whether it was EastEnders, Hollyoaks – which was a big one for me, with John-Paul and Craig – books, films and then Queer As Folk. But they were all in the periphery as it was too scary for me to say this was my favourite TV show. You’d watch it secretly at your friend’s house.
And you never wanted to say to your mum, “I identify more with him” (gay) “than with him” (straight)?
No. I wanted to be straight.
And when you finally did come out to your mum, how hard was that?
I just did it in a phone call... My heart was racing. I said it and Mum was sort of like, “Oh, that makes sense.”
So you had built it up for years in your mind and actually you probably didn’t have to build it up with her?
No. But we had a really good conversation in Growing Up Gay and I asked her, “You must have known I was gay?” and I was so impressed at how honest she was. She said she didn’t really think about it, but she sort of maybe did suspect it, but she didn’t want to think that would make my life harder. She just sort of pushed it to the side and said, “Maybe I thought you weren’t interested in having romantic partners. I just didn’t think about it.” I thought that said a lot about the burden that parenting is and not wanting your child to go through any pain.
You said earlier you wanted to be straight. What age did that feeling go?
I still had a little bit of it up until not that long ago, about 23.
If someone thought I was straight I wouldn’t correct them. Lots of gay people do that because it’s annoying having to correct people all the time, if people ask you if you have a girlfriend and you’re like, “No, actually.” But in those micro-interactions I’ve realised I’d think, “Oh, God, I wish I was straight for this interaction”, and it wouldn’t have to be a thing and I wouldn’t have to put myself out there and they might attack me for it.
When was the last time you personally felt homophobia directed at you from somebody?
A couple of years actually.
And what sort of interaction would that be?
I remember I made out with a guy I met after a festival in Liverpool and we were making out in an alleyway. And a car drives by and they shout, “You fucking fags!” and threw something. And that’s probably it. But I know I only need to look under the YouTube comments for a Years & Years video. Not that there’s loads of homophobia, because the huge majority are very supportive and want to celebrate sexuality, but it’s there.
What’s your thinking on the broader politics we are in? If I think back to when we were in government reversing the whole Section 28 thing...
...And now we’ve got same-sex marriage... Obviously we’re in a better place, but how would you define where the politics of gay rights are now?
Legally we’re protected very well but not completely, especially if you look at trans people, asexual people, intersex people. I think that’s still to come. But attitudes take longer to change and the notions that we have about the deep-rooted homophobia are also linked to ideas about gender and masculinity and just so many other things that I think will take a really, really long time to unpick.
I spoke to a friend of mine who went to a Radiohead concert in Berlin and you were playing too. He said you came on and there were people around who were literally crying. Have you ever had an artist in your life that’s done that to you?
I never got to that level, but I do have my moments of being obsessed. I was obsessed with Jeff Buckley for a while – I was convinced that Jeff Buckley and I were communicating with each other through time.
‘I’m surprised that more people aren’t talking about male suicide’
When you listen to artists such as Elton John, and you listen back to his songs, they were always about a man loving a woman. How do you feel about that now? You’ve written about a man who loved a man, right?
I always thought “Daniel” was about a gay relationship. But I was just projecting it. Don’t you? You just project meaning onto these things. Elton John had such a gay presenting persona to me, so flamboyant, that it kind of felt like he was this theatrical impresario creating these fantasies. What was the question?
Really it was whether you felt disappointed that singers in the past who were gay were not doing what you are doing?
No. I am disappointed that there isn’t more of it going on, but I think some writing is very personal, so I just want people to write the songs that they want to, but I think there are a lot of barriers that haven’t quite been knocked over.
You went on the Donald Trump march in London, didn’t you?
Yes, anti-Trump. I’m not a fan of our prime minister and I grew up... My mum’s super Labour, and my gran. We all love Jeremy Corbyn in the family. Those are very deep roots and I feel like I could never not vote for Labour. Or I could never vote for the Tories because of that.
So when you say that they love Corbyn, you mean they desperately want him to be prime minister?
And what about you?
I think he should. Why not?
Well you’ve got to think about it.
Don’t, don’t. I don’t want to! It’s too exhausting.
Why is it exhausting?
You must realise how exhausting it is. Why is it like this, Alastair? Why?
What, the world?
The world, political discourse, our politicians. I watched Jeremy Corbyn on The Andrew Marr Show and it was so frustrating, because Andrew Marr is there saying, “Aren’t you a racist though, Jeremy Corbyn?” And Jeremy Corbyn’s going, “No, I’m not,” and that was it! Whole interview. And you just think, what has anybody gained from watching this? It makes me angry.
‘What frustrates me most about Theresa May is that I feel pity for her’
What do you think about Brexit?
Well, I don’t know. How am I supposed to know about the ins and outs of the EU? I just feel like that whole issue has been distorted into this “will of the people”, and it’s like, I’m going to call my album Will Of The People and say, “Look! That’s the will of the people!” What annoys me though is how the whole idea of patriotism and nationalism and it’s patriotic to be pro-Brexit and patriotic to be anti-Brexit. Do you know what I mean? I can’t make sense of it. Help. Help us.
OK. I’m trying to help, but we’ve got to put it back to the people in a People’s Vote.
OK, yeah. That sounds good. That is annoying as well because they say it is going against the will of the people. But if you ask them again it’s still the will of the people.
Exactly. They can change their minds. Did you vote?
I was on Good Morning Britain recently with my daughter. She lived in a very political household, did politics at A-level, but she said on the show she just doesn’t understand what the Brexit debate is about.
Same here. I thought the whole point of having a democracy and elected officials is that they were meant to know about this sort of thing. We elected you to do that and now you’re telling us we have to make a decision and we have no idea how it’s going to impact the rest of our lives for generations into the future.
I agree with that, by the way. That’s why David Cameron...
Yeah, he fucked it, didn’t he?
He just ran off and put his trotters up on the beach. But if the will of the people changes, which I think it will, by the way, you would be up for another People’s Vote and you’d be backing Remain, Olly. Is that what you’re telling me?
And how about you do a few gigs for us?
Oh, I see what you’re doing now. You’re trying to really get me on board with this.
Hoping! I mean, we give you a big GQ award... I liked your speech, by the way. I thought, this guy is different...
He’s got feathers on his top!
No. It wasn’t just the feathers on your top. It was what you said. I listened to the substance. And the substance was interesting.
I’m surprised that more people aren’t talking about male suicide, because to me it’s such a huge issue affecting men.
I want to throw a quote at you. You said, “Success is overwhelming. People talk to you differently.” Who talks to you differently?
Well, my dad, for instance. People when you walk down the street and people who come up to you.
How recognised are you when you walk around?
Well, since I have red hair I think I am very!
Do you go on the Tube?
I have recently stopped going on the Tube. Well, I still take the tube sometimes, but, you know, I just feel disgusting on there and its stressful when I’m eating a Pret A Manger sandwich and I’ve got my bags and everything.
‘No one’s normal. Normal is not a thing. No one’s actually normal’
You’re eating your sandwiches on the tube?
I know. And then you see someone sneakily taking a picture of you. What is really nice is people coming up to you because they genuinely love your music or the band. That’s great. People sneakily taking pictures or not saying anything to you is a bit annoying.
Theresa May in one word?
OK, this isn’t one word, but the thing that frustrates me the most about Theresa May is that I feel pity for her. I watch her and I hate the things she is saying. I hate what she stands for. She has a Demon Headmaster thing about her and she’ll do something evil, like she’s an evil robot, but then I realise she’s a human being and she’s probably trying quite hard and she’s quite an odd character, isn’t she? And people make fun of her. I don’t like that. I don’t like when people make fun of her, but I also want to make fun of her, because I don’t like her. But now I feel sorry for her because she’s in this awful position where she’ll be remembered as the worst prime minister ever and she sold the country down the drain and I feel bad for her. But then I say no. She decimated all our services, she implemented austerity, she’s awful and...
Cameron did a lot of that.
No, he did. There is just a lot of conflicting emotions.
So “pitiful” is the word?
Pitiful probably. Yeah. But I don’t want to pity my prime minister.
Corbyn in one word?
I think he is sincere. I think that’s why people like him. They believe what he’s saying.
Do you not wish he was doing a bit more on Brexit?
Yeah. I do. I mean, he’s not perfect. That’s the thing I thought about The Andrew Marr Show. When Marr said, “Are you anti-Semitic?” and I thought that’s a line he [Corbyn] just had to stick to, but it did feel like he could have just said, “I’m really sorry. I’m really sorry I said that.”
I thought with the cartoon as well, when they showed him the cartoon.
And when he said it was a mural.
Trying to defend what he thought at the time as opposed to saying, “Yep, we got that wrong.”
Maybe it’s an ego thing. Men and their egos, Alastair.
I know. Donald Trump in one word?
Oh, the final thing. I totally related to this. You said in the documentary, “I don’t want to be normal.”
I don’t. I don’t want to be normal, I don’t want to grow up. Yeah. I mean, no one’s normal. Normal is not a thing. No one’s actually normal.
No, but there is a sense of what normal means for most people.
You’re right. It exists. It’s like, gender isn’t real! But it is actually real. In that they are things that exist, man and woman, male and female. It’s like money’s not real, but it is.