Family man Elliot setting a good Example ahead of Groove Cairngorm
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Jetsetting across the globe seems like just another part of the job when you're an international pop star.
Yet for Elliot Gleave – better known as Example, the number one-selling artist and producer headlining this year’s Groove Cairngorm – it’s as much a personal concern as it is a professional one.
The Fulham-born singer, rapper and producer has spent the last few years splitting his time between the UK and Australia, where his wife and children are.
Not that he’s complaining.
“It’s not hard at all living in Australia, you know?” Elliot laughed when he’s asked about how he’s finding splitting his time between two sides of the world. “It’s a piece of **** to live in, it’s one of the best countries in the world – probably THE best country in the world.
“But you know, my main market’s over here – my business, if you like, is over here – so I can’t live in Australia full time yet.
“And now I’m having to travel back and forth quite a lot, which is not ideal for jet lag! It’s the sort of trip, you know, 22 hours, you only really want to do once or twice a year, not 20 times a year.”
It isn’t like he even gets much time to recover – on the day this interview happens, he’s preparing to fly back to Australia after only 10 days. “Literally as I get over jetlag one way I’m going to get it the other way!”
It’s a similar fly-by-night visit that’ll see him at Groove Cairngorm – his first trip to the Highlands since he headlined Saturday night at RockNess 2013.
“I’m landing about 5pm, I’m on stage at midnight or something. then I’m leaving the next morning and heading straight back to Australia,” he explained. “I don’t think there’s going to be much time for skiing.
“I don’t think I’ve ever played a ski festival in Scotland, so this is a first. I literally just got back from Chamonix – I love skiing!
“It’s always a special treat coming back to Scotland because the crowd are just guaranteed to be loopy – and I think at a ski festival they’re going to be even more loopy.”
Example headlines the Saturday night with longtime collaborator DJ Wire. “We play all the hits, obviously,” he said. “A lot of people get confused and think it’s me DJing, but it’s more like a mash-up of lots of genres and styles and remixes as well as my songs.
“It’s more like a party whereas the live show is purely my songs and played with a live band, this is me and a DJ putting on more of a rave, you know?
“If people’s legs are already aching after a day on the slopes, they’re going to be aching even more after the gig – they probably won’t be able to go skiing or snowboarding the next day!”
A lot has changed for Example over these last five years. After the release of fifth album Live Life Living in 2014 – and another top five hit with One More Day (Stay With Me) he became a father for the first time in December that year.
Since 2014, there has been a relative trickle of releases from the prolific artist, with only three singles – Whisky Story in 2015, Later in 2016, and last month’s The Answer – released in that time.
“It’s down to the record label situation really,” Elliot said. “I’ve been recording non-stop for a few years, I’ve got hundreds of unreleased songs – I could probably release, a hip hop album, a pop album, a house album, a grime album...
“I didn’t have a record label for a year – I was kind of lost within the Sony system because I was signed to Epic Records and then Epic Records didn’t exist – so I had to find a new home.
“So that took about a year, and then we arrived at Columbia Records, who are part of Sony, and it’s then taken another year to find the right song and get the music right.”
Not that family man Elliot – who welcomed his second child last December – minds much. “I haven’t been in a rush because I’ve still been gigging and, you know, I’m happy having a bit more time with the family. Last year I did 50 gigs whereas the previous year I did about 120.
“And it’s just about getting the music right, you know – I didn’t want to come back with anything half-hearted. Also, I wanted to have the follow-up singles ready as well, so hopefully there’ll be a flurry of big releases now. Another one in April, another one in June, and then maybe an album.
Only MAYBE? “I don’t know if an album’s ever going to come out to be honest, because of the market for albums now,” he said. “An album costs a lot of money to make and people aren’t really into the whole album thing – which is a shame. They just pick their favourite songs, add them to a playlist.
“People were already doing that before, like four-five years ago people only used to listen to their favourite songs on the album and even if they had the CD they’d skip certain songs. But now it’s almost like you have an album of 12 tracks and people won’t even listen to eight or nine of them – they go straight to the singles.
“So you think of an album which is put out now – I don’t know what people spend, some people spend a million quid on an album, some people make them cheaply – but it’ll probably cost the record label a hundred grand minimum just to pay the producers and the mix engineers. And then you’ve got to market it – is it worth doing that when people just want, you know, a couple of songs?
“I know there are a handful of people out there who say, ‘Nah, I wanna hear the whole album,’ but if you’re selling a million singles but then only 10,000 albums on week one...it doesn’t really add up.”
On these matters, Elliot speaks with the wisdom that experience brings – this year marks 15 years that he’s been performing as Example.
And how things have changed for Elliot since he first set out his musical stall in 2003. “My first single – no one will know it, you can’t actually find it online – was called Everybody. It sampled Everybody Dance Now, and it was on vinyl, and it sold about 50 copies maybe.
“So that was the early days, you know, struggling to even sell a couple of vinyl records.”
Going from barely sell 50 copies of a single to a number one selling artist is the result of a lot of hard graft within the volatile music industry.
And while Groove punters will be glad to hear the passion is still more than there for touring and playing, Elliot can take or leave the rest. “I don’t know if I’ve got a passion for the industry. I definitely still love being on stage, I definitely want to keep touring and gigging, I don’t want to stop that.
“It’s hard to be as passionate about stuff when you’ve got kids. I’ve definitely still got the energy and ambition for it, but before I’d go to every gig and every event and every party – I’m not really doing that now. I tend to not go to every meeting at the record label, I pick and choose when to go in, because I feel that less is more sometimes.
“If somebody suggested 150 gigs in a year and I’ll be busier than I’ve ever been, I’d happily do that,” Elliot added. “I just don’t know if, you know, going to events and ceremonies and parties and launches and that sort of thing is really me anymore.
“You kind of grow out of that stuff.”
Example, with DJ Wire, headlines Groove Cairngorm 2018 this weekend. For more information, go to www.groovecairngorm.co.uk
