Sam Fender doesn't want to rush third album: "I’d rather it be late and great than early and s****"

1 May 2024, 10:40 | Updated: 1 May 2024, 10:56

Sam Fender Performs At Finsbury Park in 2022. Picture: Burak Cingi/Redferns/Getty

By Jenny Mensah

The Geordie singer-songwriter has revealed he doesn't want to force out the follow-up to his Seventeen Going Under album too quickly.

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Sam Fender doesn't want to rush out his third studio album.

The Geordie singer-songwriter released his Hypersonic Missiles album in 2019, followed by its follow-up Seventeen Going Under in 2021 - with both peaking at the top of the UK Albums Chart.

Though the North Shields singer has been working on his third record and has "loads of stuff" lined up for the album, he is determined to make it as good as it can possibly be.

Speaking in an upcoming interview on Sky Arts' Johnson and Knopfler's Music Legends (via BANG Showbiz), he explained: "We have been recording and recording and making loads of stuff but it got to the point where I thought, ‘We don’t need to get this out yet. We need to get it right’."

The BRITs Critics Choice winner added: “For the second one we rushed to get that out and the third one we started rushing and I thought, ‘No, we have got to take the time’.

“I want to do the best I possibly can. I’d rather it be late and great than early and s****.

“What we have got so far I am absolutely over the moon with but I want to give it that bit more time and more thought.”

The North Shields singer may not be giving us new solo material anytime soon, but he did gift us with a collaboration with Noah Kahan earlier this year.

Homesick previously features on the Vermont singer-songwriter's Stick Season album, but the pair joined forces on a reworking of the track, which new includes vocals and a new verse from the North Shields artist.

Noah Kahan & Sam Fender - Homesick (Official Lyric Video)

Sharing a collaborative post of them as young children, Kahan began: "When I first heard Sam Fender’s music, I stopped what I was doing, started “dead boys” from the beginning and listened 4 more times. It was everything I loved about a song. I followed this artist like a crazy person, checking every day to see if he had dropped new music. Reading every lyric and looking for his interpretation of what they meant. I must have listened to Hypersonic Missiles 1000 times before Seventeen Going Under came out, and I had never felt so connected to a song. I come from a very different place than Sam did, that much was clear in the lyrics, but it felt like I had grown up the same. The nostalgia, pride, bitterness, confusion, and anger that Sam wrote about feeling was so similar to what I was feeling about my childhood and my hometown at the time. This song was the final push for me to start writing about my own experiences."

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A post shared by Noah Kahan (@noahkahanmusic)

He continued: "As we sat down in Guilford, Vermont to record this album, the very first song we listened to was Seventeen Going Under. The song Homesick was born out of the confidence instilled in me by listening to someone accurately depict their hometown and what it means to them, for better or for worse.

"When I found out I’d be able to spend the day in Newcastle with Sam, I was nervous but excited. He welcomed me with open arms, let me into his world, showed me places in this community that held so much significance not only to the town, but to Sam himself. I felt very much like an outsider, but by the end I did start to understand where these songs were coming from, and just how special of a guy Sam really is. He did an absolutely amazing job bringing his experience into my song Homesick. He went above and beyond and I truly can’t thank him enough. I hope you enjoy this glance into our worlds, and that it offers you the same connection that I felt when I first heard this dude sing".

Fender commented: "I showed @NoahKahan around my hometown when he came to Newcastle on tour. Chatting with him made me realise how universal ‘homesick’ is. He's a great lad, a canny chanter and a mean wordsmith. I love the track, and I can’t wait for people to hear it".