For her label, it was seen as a flop because it did not make the Top 40 (six of its nine songs have passed 15m streams). For Raye, it was a body of work her fans could really dig into. Late last year there was a breakthrough of sorts with the release of the mini-album Euphoric Sad Songs. ‘I’ve been working every single day for a really long time’ … Raye. “I did get to 6-6,” she says with a shrug. “I was like: ‘OK, noted, I’m going to figure out how to bring that back.’” She quickly scored a UK Top 10 with the Brit-nominated Secrets, a collaboration with DJ Regard that has been streamed 280m times on Spotify. One exchange, from Christmas 2019, is seared into her mind: “The head of the label said to me: ‘It’s like you’re 6-0 down at half-time.’” She notices my shock. Communication with her new bosses slowly disintegrated. When the label head who signed her left in 2016, Raye says she became less of a priority. Early tracks like pulsating kiss-off Shhh and the boisterous banger The Line, which zoomed in on a night out gone awry, showcased pop’s secret weapons attitude, personality and an ability to switch styles, taking in everything from Afrobeats to disco.It was her collaboration with producer Jax Jones on Top 3 smash You Don’t Know Me that proved a turning point with the label: suddenly Raye seemed to be repositioned not as a long-term recording artist, but as a featured vocalist on other people’s songs. Collaborations with the rappers Stefflon Don and Mr Eazi followed. The excellent Second EP, released in 2016, featured a pre-fame Stormzy. Signed by Polydor off the back of the success of her self-released 2014 EP Welcome to the Winter, Raye’s early tracks were a combination of hazy R&B and hip-hop. I think I've always been a rule breaker at heart Some of pop’s biggest household names – Mabel, Anne-Marie, even Dua Lipa – endured EPs, mixtapes, dance music collaborations and tastemaker tracks on their long road to debut albums. Pop is littered with artists, from Chlöe Howl to Sinéad Harnett, who have signed with major labels and then been sidelined, perhaps because of shifting commercial expectations, reluctance to finance an album campaign, or simply because the person who signed them left the company. While Raye’s honesty felt unique, the situation she found herself in is not. Aware there was no turning back with her label, Polydor, she added: “I’m done being a polite pop star.” In mid-July, she announced she had been released from her contract: “Today I am speaking to you as an independent artist.” “And haven’t been allowed to put out one album.” She detailed how her “music sat in folders collecting dust”, and were being gutted, with songs passed on to other artists “because I am still awaiting confirmation that I am good enough to release an album”. “ I have been on a 4 ALBUM RECORD DEAL since 2014,” she vented to her 50,000 followers. Two days later, sitting alone in her bedroom, she opened Twitter and shattered the illusion for good. There to promote her dance bop Call on Me, – the latest in a long line of make-or-break singles – she found an innocuous query about the status of her elusive debut album triggering emotions she had suppressed for years. But then, on a lumpy turquoise sofa in a Shepherd’s Bush studio, the rictus pop star smile started to wobble. With more than 17 million monthly listeners on Spotify, seven Top 20 hits to her name and songwriting credits for the likes of Beyoncé, John Legend and Little Mix, the south Londoner’s career appeared to be going from strength to strength. T owards the end of June, while waiting to be interviewed on Channel 4’s Sunday Brunch, Raye found herself desperately trying not to cry on live TV.
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