00:00This book, I mean, for me, it's such a personal story and it's very much your story,
00:03but it's also this incredibly universal story of sexism and sexual harassment
00:09and kids and motherhood and loss, and I think it's so relatable in so many ways
00:14to just womanhood and being a woman, and there is a lot of feminism in there.
00:20Where did that come from?
00:21I don't know, I mean, I guess maybe like, you know, working in the music industry,
00:25I sort of noticed the change in tone from people that I was working with
00:30as I started to get into my late 20s.
00:32It wasn't just a sex thing.
00:37Murray, who used to do my PR, my press, he, you know, also looked after a lot of other acts
00:43within, you know, the parlourphonal warner structure,
00:47and, you know, him and I had, you know, very, or are very, very close
00:50and, you know, had a sort of ongoing dialogue about our frustrations within the industry
00:56that we were working in, and he said, you know, he would sit in meetings
01:00and, you know, talking about the different acts that they've had, Coldplay and Kylie
01:05and the Gorillas and, you know, Damon Albans, you know, whatever,
01:08and he just said the way that they talk about you as an artist,
01:13in contrast to how they would talk about Chris Martin,
01:15is just miles apart when, really, you know, you both have the same amount of creative control
01:21and do, do you know what I mean?
01:23Yeah, it's so interesting.
01:25He said it's just really, really belittling,
01:27and as I got older, those things started to become more obvious and got worse,
01:32and so I went, yeah, I became more and more frustrated by it.
01:35It's mad, and I think so much of it can then become internalised.
01:39I think women can almost start perpetuating it
01:41because we've been told this thing about what we should be for so long,
01:45and there's this amazing line in the book when you say, like,
01:49you thought that you needed a man in your life to get things done,
01:53whether that was, like, professionally.
01:55Yeah, I remember it really, really well.
01:56I went out for dinner with, you know, some new, like, potential managers.
02:00I hadn't had managers for about six months, and I'd been self-managing,
02:04and I was really, really burnt out and, you know, trying to look after my two kids,
02:09and I'd go into the record company and, you know, try and have these conversations,
02:12and I'd just feel like I was talking to a brick wall,
02:14and it got to a point where I was like,
02:16I need a man to have these conversations because they're not going to listen to me.
02:21I'm so mad.
02:23And also, I think you work with a lot of men as well.
02:26That's something that kind of comes up again and again.
02:29Do you think that was an active choice or more as a result of just the industry?
02:33It's a funny one because, like, at the beginning of my career,
02:35I felt really scared of women.
02:36Maybe it was because a lot of the sort of negative tabloid stuff
02:39that was being written about me would be written by, you know,
02:42the 3am girls from The Mirror, and, you know,
02:45I had this sort of feud with Cheryl Cole,
02:47and the music industry loved to pit women against each other,
02:49so I did kind of have this sort of, like, defensiveness around women,
02:55but I think that that's all by design,
02:57because when we do come together, we change things and usually get rid of them.
03:03It's this amazing system to, like, stop us gaining power.
03:07I had the same thing.
03:08I, like, wanted to be one of those girls that only had male friends,
03:10and, like, you know, it's such a lie.
03:12I think it's just, like, you know,
03:14wanting to avoid the humiliation of being a woman sometimes.
03:17Like, you know, I'm one of the lads.
03:20I'm not a girl.
03:21Yeah, I'm not like them.
03:23Yeah, and also, you know, my dad was, you know, a hellraiser
03:26and was not very good with the way that he treated women,
03:30and I desperately was, like, looking for his affection and, you know,
03:34validation as a kid and as a teenager,
03:36and one of the ways to do that was to go to the football with his mates every Saturday,
03:41which was a, you know, toxically masculine environment that I was in,
03:46and the way that they would talk about women in front of me
03:49made me think, I don't know, I don't want to be that.
03:53Yeah, yeah, completely.
03:54Or I want to be like you, so I want to talk about women in that way too.
03:57Like, yeah, I've got three younger brothers and it's the same thing
04:00and, like, the same thing of thinking.
04:02It never occurred to me that life would be different for us in any way.
04:06You also talk a lot about Me Too and Time's Up in the book.
04:09Do you see things changing or...?
04:11Not in my industry, I don't.
04:14I mean, to be honest with you, I'm not the best person to ask
04:16because A, I've stopped sort of reading newspapers and things,
04:20and B, I don't go out.
04:25The book is also, like, this amazing description of, like, a transformation and a change
04:29and you kind of overcoming all these horrible things that happened to you
04:34and I think what's really interesting is that it's not saying, like,
04:38I became a mother and everything changed and it was perfect,
04:40which a lot of narratives around women can be.
04:44It's sort of saying I became a mother and then changed after that.
04:48What do you think it was then that sparked that change in you?
04:52Actually, I think this book has been really helpful
04:54because I think that I've never really, like, gone back
05:00through all of the stuff that happened.
05:03And actually, you know, more recently been approached by, you know, lawyers
05:08to get involved with the hacking stuff
05:11and there's one particular news group that, you know,
05:14are sort of potentially implicated in.
05:16So I've delivered, you know, a bunch of files of press clippings,
05:19like, since the beginning from 2005 up until now.
05:23Like the weirdest scrapbook of all time.
05:25Well, I just looked at it and I was just like, how...
05:27I know this is going to sound really over the top,
05:29but it was like, how are you alive?
05:31Yeah, I felt that really horrible stuff.
05:34What I felt reading the book.
05:35And every day, you know, for years and years,
05:38and when you're in your early 20s, like, I don't...
05:40No wonder I turned into such a, like, cold nightmare
05:43because I just had to...
05:45I mean, there was no other way to cope
05:46except to just put up this barrier.
05:48Yeah, my mum will say one mean thing to me
05:50and I'll not get over it for, like, two weeks.
05:53With everything going so wrong with my last album,
05:58she's, uh, commercially, uh, artistically,
06:02and, you know, what happened to me sort of mentally
06:06as, in that period, um, meant that I had to
06:12really re-evaluate everything.
06:15Mm-hmm.
06:16Um, and decide what it was that, A, that I wanted, um,
06:20and not just to kind of be people-pleased, you know?
06:24Yeah.
06:24I think I just sort of, like, fell into this trap of, like,
06:28you know, well, what you want, Lily,
06:29is Brit Awards and free clothes
06:31and to go to lots of red carpets, isn't it?
06:34And no one really actually asked if that's what I did want.
06:38It's just that was sort of bestowed upon me
06:40and everyone's like, it's great.
06:41It's like, yeah, of course, it's great.
06:43But actually, it was never really the intention.
06:45It just sort of happened.
06:47When that didn't sort of work out with Jesus,
06:49the last record, I think my whole sort of,
06:51everything fell out from underneath me.
06:52And I remember speaking to my manager and best friend, Seb,
06:56and him saying, you know, what do you want?
06:58And I said, well, I just want to make really great music
07:01and for people to take me seriously.
07:03And he just said, okay, we're going to stop going to parties
07:07and get your own studio and sit in there
07:11and make the best record that you can.
07:12And that's what I did.
07:14And it did feel like focusing my energies on that
07:17and on the book has sort of, like, re-centered me, I think,
07:20because neither of these things have been made
07:22with the intention of being really successful.
07:24Yeah.
07:25You know, it's just about doing what I do,
07:27which is writing honestly about my experiences
07:29and hoping that people get it.
07:32Is that still what you want?
07:34Yeah.
07:35And money.
07:37And free clothes.
07:38Not so money.
07:39How do you feel about your daughter's one day reading this book?
07:43Good, actually.
07:45You know, you're younger than I am,
07:46but you might remember in your teenage years,
07:48you know, throwing everything that you could possibly throw at your parents.
07:53And my daughters are going to have a wealth of ammunition
07:59in the form of Google News and the Daily Mail Online archives.
08:04So that was sort of one of the things, you know,
08:07they are going to come,
08:08they're going to go and find all of that stuff themselves.
08:10And so this is a great way for me to go,
08:12well, there is another side to it, actually.
08:15Here it is.
08:15You might not like some of it.
08:17Sorry.
08:19Some of it's a bit much.
08:22You kind of conclude by saying that you've started to figure out this way
08:28to sort of combine motherhood and your career and your life
08:33and everything like that.
08:35Do you think writing will be,
08:38writing like books will be a part of that now more?
08:40This is about pretty predominantly about the last 15 years,
08:43which have been really interesting.
08:46I don't know.
08:46I don't know what the next bit is going to be.
08:48I was like,
08:49I don't know.
08:51I, maybe, you know.
08:54You know, I'm really,
08:54I'm on a bit of a role with writing songs at the moment.
08:57So I'm sort of well into my next record.
09:00Also started a couple of musicals,
09:02which I'm really excited about.
09:04Not starring in them,
09:05just writing those songs.
09:07I just loved,
09:09like,
09:10not even the stories about what happened,
09:12but just your views on like women and speaking up
09:14and the press and everything like that's the kind of thing
09:18I think you should still keep writing
09:19because it's so important and it's so amazing.
09:21And you were speaking up
09:22in a way that no one else was before anyone else was.
09:26I think that's the thing women are now realising
09:28they're able to do.
09:29And you almost like took the brunt for everyone.
09:32And I think are a big reason that it's all happening now.
09:35Buy My Thoughts Exactly
09:37and read it all in one day
09:38because it's amazing.
