The Diary of a CEOCraig David Opens Up About His Painful Rise, Fall & Redemption | E135
EVERY SPOKEN WORD
150 min read · 30,057 words- 0:00 – 1:17
Intro
- SBSteven Bartlett
Could you do me a quick favor if you're listening to this? Please hit the follow or subscribe button. It helps more than you know. And we invite subscribers in every month to watch the show in person.
- CDCraig David
Making moves, yeah, on the dance floor. Re-ewind. When the crowd say who? Craig David. This means so, so much to me. Everything I touched was turning to gold. Everyone wanted a piece of me and...
- SBSteven Bartlett
How does an 18, 19-year-old deal with that?
- CDCraig David
The height of success when it is like, whoa, there's so much of the, the human part that's being unmet. I felt like I was starting to make music to tick boxes. When I started to do Abandon Myself and I started to do things that just weren't in alignment, it was a point where I had dark thoughts. I was just like, "I can't live my life like this." What people enjoyed from me was music, and I realized that from when I came back to London. I feel like the kid again. And trust me, the crowd are gonna go off when they hear something soon, okay?
- SBSteven Bartlett
So 22 years later, if you could whisper in the ear of your 14-year-old self, what would you whisper?
- CDCraig David
Listen, Craig.
- SBSteven Bartlett
Without further ado, I'm Steven Bartlett, and this is the Diary of a CEO. I hope nobody's listening, but if you are, then please keep this to yourself.
- 1:17 – 15:17
Your early years
- SBSteven Bartlett
Craig, I've got some lyrics that I wanted to recite to you, okay?
- CDCraig David
Okay.
- SBSteven Bartlett
It's another day at school. And he's just walking out the door. Got his rucksack on his back and his feet dragging on the floor. Always late. But when he's questioned, he can't think of what to say. Hides the bruises from the teachers, hoping that they'd go away. Even though his mum and dad, they've both got problems of their own, caught in a catch-22, but he'd still rather be at home. Cries himself to sleep and prays when he wakes up things might have changed, but everything's the same. That's from your record Johnny from 2006.
- CDCraig David
Yeah. That was a, that was a, that was a song that I had to... It was the first time I think kinda opening up and, and expressing a experience that I felt that I had maybe on a lesser degree to a lot of other people in my school. I think at school, like, in my, my secondary school, I've had a, a very... I had a beautiful upbringing. I, I enjoyed life. I was a playful kid and I loved music. Um, but secondary school, all-boys school. Went to Bellmore in Southampton. And for the majority of it, it was, it was great times, but when you come in in your early years and you've got the older, the older boys in there and they're like, "Yo, you got two pound on you," "No, I haven't got two pound," and push you up against the wall, "You got two pound on you." Like, and then it's not a case of, like, have you got the money, it's like, "Let me check in your pockets, let me try and pull out the pockets." So, as a less degree of the bullying, I was like, I was experiencing it physically in the corridors. So I kinda... So when I was starting to write that song, I was drawing from... I had to go to how did it feel when that was happening? And it only happened with one, one, one guy in, in, at one period in the school. So I understood what bullying was. I mean, that was... I was, I was felt helpless, I couldn't... He was two years older, stronger, could rough me up if he really wanted to. But then also I was seeing other people who were getting the, a real... I was getting the psychological element, but there was a deeper side of that psychology of when they say, "Tell the teacher. They'll, they'll deal with it." This is the thing with bullying, is that I agree with... It, it needs to be spoken to someone you can confide in. But sometimes that kind of very rush in, you've told the teacher, they rush in, they... It's all out in the open. I was seeing kids who would then have a kid waiting outside of school for them. Or it might be that they, they're, they're being bullied by someone from a different school, even. So they'd be coming out to the school gates, thinking, "Okay, well, I'm on my way home." No, it's about to start when you get on the bus to go home.
- SBSteven Bartlett
Hmm.
- CDCraig David
So the whole world is now outside of school, you, you finish at 3:00 PM, and now it's, it's beginning for you. So it was... I felt deeply that I needed to write on that. Um, and like I said, my, my mum and dad had their own things going on, um, in their lives. And, and I spoke to my mum, I, I wrote the song when I was in Southampton. I've got like a studio when I was down there, and I played it to her, 'cause I wanted her to also know that, "Mum, you've always been supportive to me. Like, if, if I needed to speak to you, if I needed to say things." But with bullying, there is an element where you want to say something to the closest person in your life, be it your family, so your, your mother or your father. Um, and I wanted to really portray that in the song properly. But I wanted to have that convo with my mum to let her know, "I knew that you would've always... If I needed to speak to you, you would've been there." 'Cause I do say, "You got your problems of your own and I've tried to tell you so many times and you're not listening." And that is the case, and a lot of the cases of bullying that even family aren't listening. So who do you turn to? So, um, music has been that... That song in particular, I think that was a journey. My grandma had, had passed away at the same time. Um, it was... I just needed to get things off my chest that I felt like this is past a romantic love song. I need to help people in, in a way that wasn't trying to preach. It was just let me tell stories, anecdotes. And I do it through music, so.
- SBSteven Bartlett
And you were bullied for your weight back then as well, right?
- CDCraig David
Yeah. The, well, the weight one was... (laughs) It's funny 'cause, like, you like to tell the story differently when you're, you're in a slightly different place and position. You'll, you'll, you'll tell it like, "No, you know, I was..." And I like, I like everything about this as well. Your podcast for me has always, and I wanted to tell you off the bat.
- SBSteven Bartlett
Hmm.
- CDCraig David
What I love about you is that you're bringing out so much, so much depth in people.
- SBSteven Bartlett
Mm-hmm.
- CDCraig David
And you already know how much love I got for you anyway.
- SBSteven Bartlett
Mm-hmm. Appreciate it.
- CDCraig David
The, the being overweight thing, now I see it as actually, in hindsight, it actually... (laughs) It brought out so many things, wonderful things that I had to kind of, that had been repressed for a long period of time. But at the time, the social standard was you need to look a certain way, um, the, the captain of the school football team tended to be the one that, that the girls were interested in.
- SBSteven Bartlett
Mm-hmm.
- CDCraig David
You were the, you were the slightly overweight one that they-... they, they cry on your shoulder, tell you all your problems, have this real... you have a real empathic, uh, relationship.
- SBSteven Bartlett
Mm-hmm.
- CDCraig David
You'd be like, "What? This is connection. This is a real relationship," but we didn't want to take it any further than that. "Well, I, I, he's the one. Look at the way he scored the goal. Look at..." So then you've already got this early, um, imprint of what society ex- expects of you, and then you start trying to conform to that. So there were periods where I'd look in, in... walking down, uh, the high street and I'd look in the, in the, in the glass, the reflection in the glass, and I'd just be looking like, just feeling sorry for yourself, feeling like the jeans ain't fitting quite right and the, the jacket's not, and you're getting bigger sizes, and then you're just feeling like I'm doing all the fi-... I'm doing... I, I could run. I had so-... I had, had some legs on me, you know? And, and probably s-... boys at school would be like, "Bro, you weren't a... you weren't a very fast runner. Which part do you run it..." But I'll tell the story. I'm on a mic now.
- SBSteven Bartlett
(laughs)
- CDCraig David
Um, I was... so I could move but I was just carrying a lot of weight. Um, but not unhealthy. I think there was a point that, that when it became unhealthy was when I realized that my weight had st-... I was like 15 and, like, I think my weight had, was starting to get to... no, I was 14 and my weight had got to 14 and a half stone, so I was starting to get over my age in weight.
- SBSteven Bartlett
Mm-hmm.
- CDCraig David
And I was, and I was like, "Maybe I need to slightly rein this in a little bit, health-wise."
- SBSteven Bartlett
Mm-hmm. I ask these questions because-
- CDCraig David
Mm-hmm.
- SBSteven Bartlett
... and I always start with childhood on this podcast and I, I, I've, I've reflected on this over and over again and thought, "Maybe I should start somewhere else." But I know from my own experiences that my own, like, childhood traumas or the things that made me feel a bit invalid or insecure or felt, feel shame when I was younger-
- CDCraig David
Mm-hmm.
- SBSteven Bartlett
... ended up being, like, the, the biggest drivers in my life.
- CDCraig David
Amen.
- SBSteven Bartlett
So when I sit here and trying to find out why, you know, you got really into fitness-
- CDCraig David
Mm-hmm.
- 15:17 – 20:49
Your model of relationships
- SBSteven Bartlett
two questions on that then.
- CDCraig David
Mm-hmm.
- SBSteven Bartlett
What was the evidence or the story-
- CDCraig David
Mm-hmm.
- SBSteven Bartlett
...that your parent... your parents' relationship taught you or left you with-
- CDCraig David
Okay.
- SBSteven Bartlett
...for better or for worse? And then that first heartbreak, what were the two stories those two incidents told you-
- CDCraig David
Okay.
- SBSteven Bartlett
...about relationships?
- CDCraig David
So having no modeling of what real relationship is, it, it showed me early from, from mom and dad, as much as I love them with all of my heart, that being single is the best way to get through life. Just stay single, because I never saw my mother with another partner, I never really saw my dad with another partner, um, and I have sisters and brothers, but I never... I'd, I'd, but I'd, I'd never... And of, of my dad's other relationships that he had. Um, and I love them equally, but it's just I never had any clear reason to say that relationship works. And then it reinforces, so the story adds on later on in your life. You start to see how people are with each other who are in relationships and you get friends who are in relationships and they're maybe cheating on their partner or you're seeing how, uh, there's been scenarios where a girl says she's, she's in a relationship. And thankfully it hasn't been husband or... but there's been relationships. I'm not gonna be that... the guy saying, "I've, I've, I've never met a girl-"
- SBSteven Bartlett
Yeah.
- CDCraig David
"...who's in something." And they tell you a story that is, "Ah, I was breaking up, we're not really in it." But you're, you're starting... It's reinforcing the same thing of, "Well, stay single then."
- SBSteven Bartlett
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- CDCraig David
"Just don't get involved in all this because you... your heart will be protected and life is good and we can keep it arm's length." Then link that into the, the first breakup, first heartbreak, heart was open, gave everything, relationship I'm all in, like, "I'm gonna..." As a child I was like, "Okay..." It's hard to... Psychologically you, you don't really understand what's going on in your, in your family, your parents, but you just at school now I'm... You see a girl, "Oh, wow, I'm falling, I'm falling for you," and she's into you and it's all happening. And it could have been... I think it was only like about week, week and a half, yeah, the break, yeah.
- SBSteven Bartlett
Really?
- CDCraig David
It wasn't... It was... So this is what I'm talking early, early days.
- SBSteven Bartlett
Mm-hmm.
- CDCraig David
But when your heart is fully open-
- SBSteven Bartlett
Yeah.
- CDCraig David
...the crushing feeling I had after that set the tone for the rest of my life until now I've unpacked the whole thing, which, which all goes hand in hand with some of the songs I've written on albums before, where I'm talking about breakups. There's a song called Thief in the Night which is about a girl who, like, "Why did you have to end up being with my best friend? Like, why did..." There's moments when I'm looking back thinking, "When I was writing that song, what was I feeling?" I was feeling the same heartbreak that I had or the same zero understanding of what relationship is. And then now I see it's all about relationship, it's all about opening your heart up again. The same feeling that I think we both share when you said that you had your moments of the trigger points and you, like-
- SBSteven Bartlett
Mm-hmm.
- CDCraig David
...had to open up again and you met someone who met you at a place to help you through that, which is even better when you meet someone who's conscious and gets it and says-
- SBSteven Bartlett
Yeah.
- CDCraig David
"...I've got you." I... And baby steps if we need to, but I'm with you, yeah.
- SBSteven Bartlett
Mm-hmm.
- CDCraig David
I'm at that place now where I'm like, "Ah, my heart's open."
- SBSteven Bartlett
Do you think your heart's open?
- CDCraig David
My heart's open, man.
- SBSteven Bartlett
Yeah.
- CDCraig David
It's open in a way that I'm, I'm down if it, if something tried to, tried to close it down, I'm open as much as I was when I first had my heart open. And I, I wouldn't have said that maybe in f- a few years back. The journey has kind of rapidly kind of entered into a phase where I just know that that's th- the, the truth of the matter.
- 20:49 – 24:28
Growing up on a council estate
- CDCraig David
- SBSteven Bartlett
One of the other things, talking about things that kind of invalidated us when we were younger or that we were aspiring to, I, I saw this quote and I actually saw a picture of the estate you lived on.
- CDCraig David
Hmm.
- SBSteven Bartlett
And it's, um, I'm gonna say, it's not the estate that I would wish to have lived on.
- CDCraig David
(laughs)
- SBSteven Bartlett
I don't want to criticize, you know, an area, but it's not... It, it didn't look... I saw like a gray apart- apartment block and it-
- CDCraig David
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
- SBSteven Bartlett
... it looked like a- Quite, you know...
- CDCraig David
... council state vibes there.
- SBSteven Bartlett
It was a council estate, yeah. Um, and you... The, the quote you said was, you were a kid looking out of your bedroom window at the estate car park imagining jacuzzis.
- CDCraig David
Huh. Do, do you know what? I think to correct the quote even more-
- SBSteven Bartlett
Okay, please, yeah.
- CDCraig David
Yeah, because the jacuzzi one, like... (smacks lips) It's funny 'cause I was talking about this only yesterday about like, when I was speaking about Fill Me In and I was like, yeah, I was like, jumped in the jacuzzi. And I was thinking, what jacuzzi was I actually jumping in? Because last time I checked, you were in a, a two bedroom flat with your mum, yeah? So the only jacuzzi you were jumping in was your bath, yeah?
- SBSteven Bartlett
Yeah. (laughs)
- CDCraig David
So that's, let's put that on record. And you were in a four by four, yeah?
- SBSteven Bartlett
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- CDCraig David
Okay, cool. So which driving license did you have at that point? 'Cause you were only like 15, 16 when you were writing that song. It was aspirations.
- SBSteven Bartlett
Aspirations.
- CDCraig David
By looking out of that window, overlooking that car park, what my grandmother brought to the, to the table in terms of like... I mean, the love that... My mum and... Just from my family, I'm just very grateful for that upbringing. But my grandma, as grandmas do, wanna make sure you, you get the right food in, in you, make sure you wear the jacket. You know what I mean? 'Cause it's gonna get cold, it's gonna rain later on. And you're like, "Grandma," and then it rains. They just have this wisdom, yeah?
- SBSteven Bartlett
Hmm.
- CDCraig David
But she had a beautiful little garden w- in the house that she lived, and it was like five minutes away from where I lived. And I was just like, that for me would, was, was enough as an inspiration to say, "If I could have a house with a garden in Southampton, we're good here." I mean, little did I know that, th- how it would cascade from the music into... Yeah, just that, that times 10 in terms of just-
- SBSteven Bartlett
Yeah.
- CDCraig David
... like my eyes being opened, but it was that inspiration from my grandma. And I looked at the car park and it was like, ca- it, it, it kept me on my grind, I kept me on my grind. That council estate, uh, working class family growing up made me have to make ends meet where secondary school wasn't really setting me up for when I leave here. I was like, I was already doing my market stall selling of, uh, chocolates at school.
- SBSteven Bartlett
(laughs)
- CDCraig David
Already had that going on. I was already doing mixtapes. So that was my kind of go-to in the barbers selling mixtapes for 10 pounds that I'd be doing at home, which would buy another piece of equipment, that I'd get another speak- another pair of speakers or another mini disc player to record on. Then I was getting a printer so I could print my own covers. Then I, I, I was... Everything I kind of am doing now, weirdly enough, is no different than what I was doing when I was a kid. I literally had my wh- whole little factory of making tunes, trying to have a little business going on so I can make ends meet in my own way without having to try and pull money from my mum 'cause she already had her own things going on and she supported me beyond. Like, I think she was going deeply into overdrafts just to make my, my life feel comfortable. You got the Sega Mega Drive, right? It was Sonic the Hedgehog and those m- those games. Yeah, that's what brought my memories first. Look...
- SBSteven Bartlett
(laughs)
- CDCraig David
Yeah, you got the... But when I think back, there was my, um, wherever my money was get... Wherever my mum was getting this money from, like, she was deeply in debt. So when you look back, you say, "Mom, the love I have for you, like 9:00 to 5:00, and making me feel like I was getting everything that any other kid was getting." You know what I mean? But... And my dad, you know what I mean? Like he, he support... He would, he would never... No one could cross me. No one, no one could do anything bad to me, my dad had me. They'd have to cross my dad, and that was the kind of... And that protection is good to a certain degree, but then when you grow up-... dad's not there to do things, so how, where's that part? So you're having to understand I've got so much
- 24:28 – 36:36
Your early music influences
- CDCraig David
feminine energy in me and that part, but I need the-
- SBSteven Bartlett
Hmm.
- CDCraig David
... speaking of truth, action now. So it's-
- SBSteven Bartlett
The yang.
- CDCraig David
It's, uh, the yang, my man.
- SBSteven Bartlett
Yeah, yeah.
- CDCraig David
The yang.
- SBSteven Bartlett
Yeah.
- CDCraig David
The yang.
- SBSteven Bartlett
So you talk about music there, and, uh, one of the things that was really remarkable reading through your story is how early music came into your world-
- CDCraig David
Mm-hmm.
- SBSteven Bartlett
... and how early you started, like, selling mix tapes and... I sat here with, I've sat here with many mu- musicians, and it tends, tended to happen a little bit later in life. Even Diplo sat here last week and-
- CDCraig David
Okay.
- SBSteven Bartlett
... with Diplo it was, I don't know, he was 25 or something before he really started going in music.
- CDCraig David
Yeah.
- SBSteven Bartlett
But you were, you were young.
- CDCraig David
Mmm.
- SBSteven Bartlett
I know your dad had an influence in that because he was very into reggae-
- CDCraig David
Yeah.
- SBSteven Bartlett
... and he was in a reggae band, right?
- CDCraig David
Yes.
- SBSteven Bartlett
But where did music show up in your life? And then, and how did that obsession kinda, like, take hold?
- CDCraig David
Um, (sighs) I mean, it was earl- (gasps) like I said when I, earlier on when I said, like, y- your little high-five when you come into the world, I feel that and y- you lose sort of the cognitive understanding as to what's going on and why we're here and then... but there's something intuitively that's pulling you in certain directions. And as a child you very much honor that, you just go in the direction. So I was always intrigued by the little hi-fi setup my mum had at the, in the flat with the big box of records, and I'd just be flicking through them. Um, and I, and there was a, a vinyl in there that was Ebony Rockers, which is my dad's reggae group, which more recently there's a mural now in Southampton they put on, on Algo Road, huge mural that says about Ebony Rockers and I'm thinking-
- SBSteven Bartlett
Wow.
- CDCraig David
... "Wow," so proud of my dad. I was like, "Yes, Dad," 'cause you are a musician in your heart, bass guitar player. The, the, the group were talking about, um, social issues that were going on in the '70s, '80s, and being able to put that on record and talk about injustices that were going on in their lives in Southampton and have it on record, but now you're getting recognized for that. Oh man, like I just love, love my dad for that. It's like I'm just so happy for him. So I was looking at records and I pulled out his record and I'd be like, "Ebony Rockers." And my mom would say, "Yeah, that's your dad's group." And I'd be like, "Well my dad's, like..." Early though, I'm talking like five, six years old looking, like, "Well, my dad's in a group." So I know that it's definitely there's some lineage there, there's, there's DNA that comes through musically. My mum was always into Stevie Wonder and Michael Jackson. Uh, my first ever seven-inch I ever bought was, uh, it was Human Nature.
- SBSteven Bartlett
Oh, really? What? Michael Jackson?
- CDCraig David
Yeah. 'Cause it, it was on a seven-inch. It was in a li- it was a small little box next to the, the 12-inch.
- SBSteven Bartlett
(laughs)
- CDCraig David
Um, it was the first one I bought. That's what, let me tell you, tell you it, right. It was the first one I bought, first song I ever bought. So that's why, and the, I mean, look at the lyric of the song.
- SBSteven Bartlett
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- 36:36 – 52:14
Your rise in music
- SBSteven Bartlett
Between 14 and 18 then-
- CDCraig David
Hmm.
- SBSteven Bartlett
... what happens then for you?
- CDCraig David
I'd gone from the, the songwriting competition, uh, a moment where it was like, "Okay, this is the, this is the, this is the thing," but then it carried on where, okay, this wasn't necessarily, yeah, the big breakthrough. Heavily into the v- into collecting records. I started to DJ early on. I was MC at first for, uh, another DJ called DJ Flash, who I respect so much because he brought a lot into my life to, to be able to be a chaperone for me, really. He knew my dad, um, and he was 10 years older than me. And I, at that, at 14, I looked a little older as well so I, I can kinda get, I could style it to get into clubs with him and he let me be his MC. So I would be called MC Fade and I was just like, you know what I mean? The Fade was Chris and I just thought that was the-
- SBSteven Bartlett
Hmm. Yeah.
- CDCraig David
Uh, it's cra-... And then he give me like a, he gave me a little slot, uh, to, to play maybe a little 15 minutes at the end of his DJ set. So in Southampton, he was playing most of the, the kind of big clubs there and he introduced me to the Cage & Zoo in Bournemouth.
- SBSteven Bartlett
Mm-hmm.
- CDCraig David
Um, we do a couple shows in, in Portsmouth. So I was like his, I was his MC and also his box boy as well, 'cause trust me, the back was getting like smashed picking up those heavy boxes, yeah? It's different. When you're wearing the chain with the MP3 on it, it's different when you're picking up those boxes, right?
- SBSteven Bartlett
(laughs)
- CDCraig David
Your, your squat game's gotta be really on point. Your glutes will be f- will be fired up. But I'd always do this thing with him where I'd be like, "Flash, I think, I think I see that girl over there." I was trying to find like a girl he had his eyes on, and he'd be, he'd be watching her all through the night. I'd be like, "I think she, she keeps looking at you, man. You need to go. You need to go and speak to her." He goes, "Yeah, but ..." I go, "D- don't worry, I got you! I'll, uh, let me, you go speak to her, man, 'cause she's gonna, she's gonna go and it's all gonna ... Okay, cool. Le- le- handle the fort." "I'll handle the fort. Don't you worry." So I played like a little half an hour thing, yeah? He's skirting around, "Should I go and speak to her? Should I ..." And he's just standing next to her. He goes over for the, for the move. She blows him out completely 'cause she was never looking at him at all for the whole thing, right?
- SBSteven Bartlett
(laughs)
- CDCraig David
I've got a 30-minute DJ set, and then he's coming back like, "Great. It's like she didn't even..." I goes, "I don't know. She was looking at you all the time. I'm not sure."
- SBSteven Bartlett
(laughs)
- CDCraig David
You gotta find your ways, yeah? But I learned from between th- that 14 to, to, to really to 16 was a period of DJing intensely. Then I started to go off and do my own DJing sets with MC Alistair, who is part of the Artful Dodger.
- SBSteven Bartlett
Mm-hmm.
- CDCraig David
He goes and does MC sets now. Um, and then it was kind of, it was moving. I was at college. I'd gone from secondary school, now I was at college, at City College. I was doing an NVQ Level 2 in electronics. It was like the closest thing I could get to music because there wasn't like, uh, production, uh, courses like they do now, which would've been great. Back then, it was like, "How do you forge a trumpet out of metal?" And, "How was, how do you make a guitar from scratch with wood?" And I'm like, "You know, I just wanna know how Timbaland makes that, or Rodney Jerkins makes the, the, the vocal sound so good. Could someone show me that?" 'Cause then there wasn't a course. So I thought, "Let me do electronics because at least that gets me closer to circuit boards."
- SBSteven Bartlett
Mm-hmm.
- CDCraig David
Richard Sounds was around the corner, had some wicked equipment in there. I thought even if I got a, a job working there, it would be great. I'd be near d- decks, I'd be near twin tape cassette decks. Maybe I can get a little discount. So that was my road. I was going down DJing, emceeing there. Never thought it would necessarily mean meeting Mark Hill and Pete Deveraux from the Artful Dodger, which is where it, it really then transcended.
- SBSteven Bartlett
Tell me about that.
- CDCraig David
So in one club, it was called Old Orientals, um, 10 minutes around the corner from where I, my, I was living with my mum, um, was DJ-ing downstairs, uh, R&B, hip hop set. Upstairs was house and garage night. Um, Mark Hill and Pete Deveraux who, the original Artful Dodger, were playing upstairs. Now these are early doors for garage music, so you're hearing like, It's a London Thing was playing. Um, Scott Garcia, which was like a classic garage tune from them days. And it was even like the, the Lessons In Love was coming through Robbie Craig, and there was just tunes playing. And I'd always go pop my head up and be like, it wasn't packed up there, but I was just like, "Th- this is, this is a vibe." It's got like, it's like this r- they're layering R&B stuff now, it felt, over this skippy, well, like, what do you call it? Is, I didn't know what two-step was. It was like, is this beat garage? It was this weird like, some eclectic thing that's not house, but it feels UK. And then all of a sudden we got into a conversation and I was talking about all these songs that I'd been recording at home where I didn't have a producer or someone who could create the music for me. Um, I was using instrumentals and stuff to just sing over, like you'd hear a freestyle. And then literally the, the, I mean, this is why it's so divine, like, the serendipity of it was so beautiful. Mark Hill, who ended up producing the whole of the Born To Do It album, said, "I've been looking for someone who writes songs. Like, I, I do music, like, I've got the music thing locked down, but I need somebody who, who writes songs you can sing." And I was like, "Oh, this is a perfect marriage." And he says, "Oh, I've got a studio. It's like five minutes from here at a place called Ocean Village." And I was like, "You can't be making this up." Like, it's, it was the cl- like, my, my flat, the o- the Old Orientals place that we met, the studio was literally within a 10-minute walk. It was like all perfectly planned. And then from that, the next thing I did was record a song called, uh, What You Gonna Do? Which was the first release from Artful Dodger. And I remember it being printed up on a, on, on vinyl. They did their own thing, boxed it all up. I felt sweet. When you're on a vinyl, I thought I'd made it at that point.
- SBSteven Bartlett
(laughs)
- CDCraig David
I was on vinyl, yeah?
- SBSteven Bartlett
(laughs)
- CDCraig David
And it got up in a van and they took it up to London, they go into the record stores and they say, "Look, we got them to take two boxes here at this record store. And, uh, So- in Derby Street, in Soho Records there, in Brixton we've got some-" I was like... And something started to build, my man. I, I can't... I was like just happy to be on a record, but then all of a sudden, I was getting people saying who they've b- come back down from London saying, "I'm hearing your tune getting played on power radio stations, you know." I'm like, "What?"I'm hearing, like, it's going off, (singing) drop the funk, drop the bass, hit it. And I'm like, "What are you f- " And I like... and, but then random people were saying, "Oh, when I, I was coming back from London, it's ge- it's getting played. Like, I went to a, a club, it went off. The DJ spun it, like, four times back to back." Something was bubbling. And next thing you know, I got a call from Public Demand, who were the label that were, that had got invested in that, in that record. They'd done a licensing deal for that song. They said, "Do you wanna come up to London, start doing some, some PAs, some per- some performances for this song?" I said, "I'd love to." So I call up my mate, Clinton, in his yellow Fiesta, remember it clearly, got the Jamaican flag in the back, yeah, just like he had it proudly there. He had, like, the, the sub speaker in the boot going crazy. The thing was tuned up like he was coming, going to Notting Hill Carnival, you know, the sound system was way more than the car, right? It sounded crisp. So we're up there, I had to slip him, like, £50 to, to get me up there, get me back. And literally I go up, I was getting like two f- 250, £300 for a, for a PA, which was good money. I'm like, "Wow, this is real money now. From selling chocolates to this kind of money. I can buy this record, I can buy that." And I go to the Coliseum, um, in Vauxhall, um, The End, um, and I started, Twice as Nice was the, the big, big name at the time. And I go out there and sing Whatcha Gonna Do, and I'd, I'd go on stage and I was this young 15-year-old kid, I was 16 at the time, walked out and I had the, the DJ... It was more like a, there was... any DJ could play 'cause the Artful Dodger, we had this sort of agreement that if Artful Dodger were with me performing, we're doing a set together, we'd sort of half the amount for the, for the, for the fee. And if I was going off doing a performance, then I would just take the money, and if they did a, a DJ set somewhere, they'd take it. So we just had a nice little agreement going on. So I go up there and the DJ would just say, "You ready? You ready?" Okay, yeah, I'm ready, I'm ready. And he'd be like (singing) drop the funk, drop the bass, hit it. And that's for the first time walking out, seeing it go off. I was just like, "This is mad." And before I even got to sing, the guy is ne- spinning it up and everyone's going (singing) which is where, led to Bo' Selecta with Rewind, why I was saying that in the song, it's like, bo, bo, Bo' Selecta. That was the phrase as a cultural reference for that music. And I think that that's where it kind of just, it, it just, it just was exponential after that. It just went from Whatcha Gonna Do, then Rewind was starting to go, do its thing, and people were just losing their minds to that song. Like, I remember my first personal per- PA of that song, I wasn't sure if the crowd were feeling it because it goes into this h- this bass line in the chorus which is very... it feels like a halftime R&B record. Let me hear it. It goes like... so it's like (singing) so it's like, re-e-wind. When a crowd say Bo' Selecta, re-e-wind. You just got the baseline (singing) it's halftime, you could just be a slow jam. (singing) And people... and I saw people literally, they were standing like... and it wasn't like we're not feeling it, but it's like, "We don't know what to do here." Yeah. (laughs) Like, 'cause the ver- the verse is (singing) making moves, yeah, on the dance floor. You got the garage things, cool, and then it goes (singing) and people were like... and then when it... and that was its USP in the end. Mm-hmm. People were like, "There's that tune that does that halftime, I don't know what, baseline thing, but it goes slowed..." and it set the tone for the whole thing. That song right there still is like my baby, 'cause I felt it when I walked home with my Sony Walkman, with my headphones on, on my Jack Jones, just like walking back, like, just listening to it, thinking, "I don't need..." there's certain songs where I don't need any feedback, I don't need others to tell me what they think about it, how they feel. I know in my soul this here is the one. And it wasn't the one from, "It's gonna go off in a club." This is gonna go off when I go back to my flat, I had a huge sub speaker that was probably bigger than me, yeah, that I had in the corner, bigger than most of my room. I had to squeeze my bed out almost to get it in. When I pressed play on that and it came through that speaker, I was like this, "I don't... I'm good." I'd got the, the full, uh, feeling that I needed. So from then I was like, "If this is the same for anyone else and they feel like this, then it's gone clear." And it ended up being
- SBSteven Bartlett
And that is a, a timeless, timeless record. I mean, I listened to it before you came in here.
- CDCraig David
Mm-hmm.
- SBSteven Bartlett
So I was listening to it, and I was like, "Fuck, it... this could have come out last week." Do you know what I mean?
- CDCraig David
Far out.
- SBSteven Bartlett
It feels like that. Do you see what I mean? Like, I played it and I was like, "This could be, this would be a hit now." Do you know what I mean? So-
- CDCraig David
Bruh, I appreciate you.
- 52:14 – 1:02:46
How were you dealing with your meteoric rise?
- SBSteven Bartlett
How does, how does an 18, 19-year-old deal with that? 'Cause, you know, with all the attention comes a lot of negative stuff.
- CDCraig David
Mm-hmm.
- SBSteven Bartlett
It's, like, unavoidable. It comes with the territory. Even with the, like, the fame and people clambering on you and stuff-
- CDCraig David
Yeah.
- SBSteven Bartlett
...it changes... Your psychology takes a shift, or you find out who you really are, right? They say that a lot. Like, you find out-
- CDCraig David
Yeah.
- SBSteven Bartlett
...all your demons, right? Because now you've got the money, you've got the power, you've got this admiration. So talk to me about, like, the, the other side of that.
- CDCraig David
Mm-hmm.
- SBSteven Bartlett
That meteoric rise.
- CDCraig David
I'd say channeling in of how I... Or tuning in to how I was at that time, I'd say the... It was euphoric. There was... I was like, "Whoa, everything's new." You're doing new places and going to the best restaurants and your eyes are wide open. You're on a plane to this country. And I went... I was at the House of Blues in, in, in America doing... We had three nights there, and the first night... And I tell this because it kind of... Just to give context to how bizarre it was. So remember, I've come from, "Yo, Flash, I think that girl likes you over there. Let me do a little mix for you. Over here get a little half an hour in the set." Jump fast-forward a few years later, House of Blues, three nights in a row. First night, Missy Elliott is, has come to watch the show. I'm looking up thinking, "This is crazy." Like...
- SBSteven Bartlett
Wow.
- CDCraig David
"I Can't Stand the Rain" and then Missy Elliott, just the whole... Next night, I'm there, I look up in the same balcony, Jennifer Lopez is there. I'm like, "Wow." And I don't want it to sound like I'm name-dropping but I want it to be... To give context. It's just...
- SBSteven Bartlett
Mad.
- CDCraig David
It's facts, yeah? The, the, the following night... Sorry, how am I missing this? It was... (laughs) It was Missy and Beyoncé.
- SBSteven Bartlett
Fuck off.
- CDCraig David
Then it was Jennifer Lopez. Then on the last night, I look out into the crowd and there's a lot of, kind of, attention on one in particular gentleman that's in the crowd who's singing. I couldn't quite work out 'cause the lights were too, too dark. So I got the front of house to turn the lights up. And I look in the crowd and I'm singing Walking Away, and I look over and I see Stevie Wonder singing-
- SBSteven Bartlett
You're joking.
- CDCraig David
...Walking Away. And I'm just like... I mean, what do you say at that point? I didn't know... I felt emotional. I felt... 'Cause it was Stevie Wonder from the record collection, from my mum's stuff, Beyoncé, I've got Destiny's Child on my wall. I had Jennifer Lopez on my wall. Missy Elliott I'd only been listening to before I come out. It was just like, "You can't make this up." It was almost like...... yes, you've, you've behind the scenes and bam, here it is. And then I got to meet him at the end and he'd come with Quincy Jones, who we all know is the producer of all of the huge hits for Michael Jackson. And then Quincy said, "You know, like, MJ..." No, what he did is he said it even more like, like coded. He's like, "Yeah, Em..." It was like Em, he said. It was like, "Em's got your album." Like he was just like vibing. I said, "Who, Em?" "Yeah, you know MJ, Michael. Michael's got like, he's got the album. He loves Born To Do It. He's been listening, gave it to his friends." And I was, I was, "Stop this." If we can, if this is, if this is the thing, we've arrived, we're good, I've got my fix. There's not much more I could ask for. But it was literally the start of an incredible rollercoaster ride, which later, la- the later years I think, which we get into, it, it, it harps back to that. And I can f- I can see where the, the cracks were starting. Because when... To answer your question about the other side of it, it was so euphoric and I was so swept up on it, it was like getting on a surfboard and actually being on the wave. And you're, you're doing, I don't know, there's a... I never use this word, but like the most gnarliest, like you're on the gnarly wave. It's gnarly, you know what I mean? You're the, the, the... there's a rip, rip current and it's going crazy. You're through the middle, the eye of it, you're on it. You're not coming off. But then there was a point when the next album, Slicker Than Your Average, dropped, which was only like a year or so later, 2002. Had great success with Watch your Flava and, and the s- and the songs were hitting, but there was this... Born To Do It had now done seven million albums. Which-
- SBSteven Bartlett
Six times plat- platinum.
- CDCraig David
Oh.
- SBSteven Bartlett
Six times platinum.
- CDCraig David
It's, it's, it's still, still crazy.
- SBSteven Bartlett
Maths.
- CDCraig David
And when you said about the Wembley Arena, three times sold out, I'm standing outside there's a sign, I've got it at my mom's house, like there's a picture of... And I'm like, you just can't make it up. It's, it, it was so beautiful and I'm so grateful for those times. But I started to see from the Slicker Than Your Average time where the record label would already start to quote a, "Oh, it's gonna do 10, 11 million obviously, Slicker Than Your Average 'cause now the trajectory's gonna be... It has to go higher than this." So then when the album ended up coming out, it ended up selling 3.5 million albums. I'm, 3.5 million albums. Yeah, at the time I remember that there was this feeling in the company of, "Ah, hmm, right, only 3.5." And I'm, I'm, I'm impressionable. I'm a young kid. I don't know. I'd, I've just got into this, the, the music business and you're telling me that that's not a good thing. 'Cause last time I checked, the feeling I'm getting is, I just want 3.5 million albums. Give 3.5 million to any artist now, f- it's like we're good. We've, we're, we're, we what... So I'd already started to buy into there was some- it was, there was a traject- the trajectory was starting to go in a different place that, that I wouldn't even know about figures. I didn't really care about albums sales. I was just like, "I'm just happy to be here and I'm making music and I'm doing what I love, my dream." But that was the first learning curve of the, the, the, the defining of, defining of product and defining of you being a commodity that has to achieve something now that you've set it up here. Whereas I thought it got all fun when you started to do it. I thought it got more playful. And then it got more serious and there's more cooks in the kitchen and everyone's got an opinion of the song you should be releasing. And everyone's-
- SBSteven Bartlett
Expectation.
- CDCraig David
Beyond. Yeah.
- SBSteven Bartlett
Expectation. The curse of all-
- CDCraig David
Thank you.
- SBSteven Bartlett
... happiness and joy and... (laughs)
- CDCraig David
You must know this. You're just trying to equate what your self worth through so many other people's expectation of you, like you said. So I'm trying to say, "Okay, cool, well, we're here." I'm a songwriter. I'd always, I'd always had a really great rapport with my manager, Colin Estelle, who's been with me like for... I got... I, I love the conversations that we've, we've had over the years and, and him even saying at early doors that, "I can't guarantee you success. I, but I'll do everything in my power to, to pro- to protect you and keep you safe so you can do your thing." And having those kind of confidence in, in, in the people that you're working with is, is, is paramount when you do start to get these, the feedback trickling through, 'cause I never was like, "Oh yeah, what are today's midweeks?" I wasn't really too interested in like finding out all the stats because what happens is, and tod- and you can get this now, and I say this to any aspiring artist who's putting music out now and you're having success, is literally just enjoy it fully. Be immersed in it, because if you start to check for what's going on next week, your moment when you're supposed to have the number one and you're enjoying life, you're already gonna be able to see by Tuesday, Wednesday that your numbers are already showing that you're already number three now. You've slipped off and they're number one. So your moment of glory was actually, there was the curve and at the point where you got the thing which is the, the beautiful metal number one, already, you're already not, you're already kind of on the decline. So it's that I had to ride that for a few more albums, if I'm being honest, to... I was making songs and they were connecting but if it was a number four in the charts but it wasn't number one like it was before, haven't got the same amount of time that I had to, to make those songs. I've got, haven't got enough life really. All those sort- those first albums, they're very seminal because it's all your life up until that point, right? And then after that the expectation is, "Well, we need it on a deadline and we need it this time and you've got f- hit this," in the mix of the fact you're doing 100 interviews and you're doing... you're flying all over the place but still you've got to conjure up that thing. I don't know any artist that, that, that won't feel that. And hats off and kudos to anyone who is able to sustain that, but as a human being, I know that's a tall order for anyone to be able to, to continuously do, and you start to see with any of the artists who we put in from, from the Amy Winehouses to the Michael Jacksons to the Whitney Houstons. The, the height of success when it is like whoa, like otherworldly, there's so much of the, the human part that's being unmet that it, it gets to a point where breaking point and then something happens, be it's, it's drug addiction or if it, it moves into mental health issues and depression which are all so real.... that no human can vibrate at that level for that amount of time. And I, and I, I'm thankful for those moments that kind of shaved off a little bit of the, it being all go, go, go. Because I think they kind of made me have to go back to a lot of things that were ... like when my, my grandmother passed away, which is when the next
- 1:02:46 – 1:13:58
Losing yourself
- SBSteven Bartlett
And you described that journey as a, as a rollercoaster.
- CDCraig David
Mm-hmm.
- SBSteven Bartlett
So what, at what point did, did that rollercoaster start heading down from that, um, y- place you describe as euphoria to a place where you, um, weren't euphoric? Talk t- talk to me about the, the down part of the rollercoaster.
- CDCraig David
I'd say when I released, uh, the Trust Me album in 2009, um, it, it just felt that it was ... from where I'd started off with very cultural records like Rewind and Fill Me In, which is why we talked earlier how there's songs you can play now and they still seem to hit. When I, when I look at 2009 and the Trust Me album, I f- I felt like I was starting to m- make music that was to please, please people and to tick boxes. It was like I was... There's a song called Top of the Hill, which is a lovely song, um, I love the song, but if you listen to that song to how it started off, it was very far removed. The type of music was becoming very live and it wasn't as, it wasn't as synth-based and, and so... which I'd drawn all my inspirations from as a, as a kid. And that's not to say that you can't experiment, but I knew at that point I was entering into a new space, and then by the time I released that album, which I was proud of, I'm always proud of the music I put out, but it wasn't connecting as well. Signed, Sealed, Delivered was, uh, an album that I did just after that, which was I was out of a, a deal at the time, um, just because I'd run the, the tenure of my, my, my deal, um, so it was kind of a fresh start. I could look at different record labels. Universal were, were excited so we did a deal with Universal. Then I was ... put out this album called Signed, Sealed, Delivered, which was an, uh, a covers album. (inhales deeply) And I was singing, like, Dock of the Bay and the title song, Signed, Sealed, Delivered, from Stevie, but verbatim like the originals. It wasn't some chopped and screwed. It wasn't an R&B version. It wasn't a garage thing. It wasn't like your ... it was like-
- SBSteven Bartlett
The same song.
- CDCraig David
... the same song. And I felt like it was time that I needed to just sort of check myself and just be like, "Are you getting the fun out of this like you used to? Do you wanna continue making music like this?" And thankfully, the, the, the, the world always, th- the universe always sort of mirrors everything that you're going through. So it mirrors your state of play of where you are. So I always felt that I was g- if the feeling I was getting was being mirrored back, I'm not quite feeling this, so the world says, "Cool. I'll give you more of you're not quite feeling this in your circumstances that happen around you." Whereas when I was the kid growing up making the first album, I was feeling everything. I was feeling the song on the way home from the studio. I was feeling it on my sub speaker at home. I was feeling those rides up in the car to do the performance. It was feeling.
- SBSteven Bartlett
Mm-hmm.
- CDCraig David
(smacks lips) And now I check in with that deeply because I know that anytime I'm not feeling it, act from that, not from the head saying, "Well..." I don't know, Seal had a big covers album at the time, I think that was a good reference point. He had a huge covers album, was doing w- serious numbers. And that was the sentiment that Universal were, were presenting, like, "Do a covers record, no-brainer, you can sing these songs. Motown, gonna be good as a soul thing, and then off- springboard off the back of that with your own album." That was the, the play. Was never really worked out that way 'cause it, it didn't really work out as an album. It didn't hit the way it did, and there was no next album that came from, off the back of that. There was a period of time where I was like, I was outta the scene for a second.
Episode duration: 1:36:08
Install uListen for AI-powered chat & search across the full episode — Get Full Transcript
Transcript of episode H4gh63mJI1c
Get more out of YouTube videos.
High quality summaries for YouTube videos. Accurate transcripts to search & find moments. Powered by ChatGPT & Claude AI.
Add to Chrome