Sam Smith Comes Out, Says Debut Is Dedicated to Unrequited Love
Following speculation about his sexuality, singer-songwriter Sam Smith has come out as gay, telling Fader that his forthcoming debut album, In the Lonely Hour, “is about a guy that I fell in love with last year, and he didn’t love me back.” Tabloids had linked Smith previously to model Daisy Lowe, though he said the relationship was platonic. The video for “Leave Your Lover,” a single off the album, was not clear about his sexuality.
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“It’s about a guy and that’s what I wanted people to know – I want to be clear that that’s what it’s about,” he said in the interview. He later added, “I want to make it a normality because this is a non-issue. People wouldn’t ask a straight person these questions. I’ve tried to be clever with this album, because it’s also important to me that my music reaches everybody. I’ve made my music so that it could be about anything and everybody – whether it’s a guy, a female or a goat – and everybody can relate to that.”
Regarding his past relationships, the 22-year-old said that he had never been in a relationship before, only “unrequited relationships.” His experience with the man who inspired In the Lonely Hour left him in what he described as a lonely and “very dark” place.
Smith eventually told the man that he had inspired the album, and he is glad he did. “It was good as a form of closure, to get it off my chest and tell him,” he said. “I feel better for it. I feel almost like I signed off this part of my life where I keep giving myself to guys who are never going to love me back. . . . It’s all there now, and I can move on and hopefully find a guy who can love me the way I love him.”
In March, Smith released the video for “Stay With Me,” an In the Lonely Hour track in which he sings, “Guess it’s true, I’m not good at a one-night stand.” That same month, he performed that song on Saturday Night Live, as well as “Lay Me Down.” His debut is set to come out June 17th.