Oliver Sim, member of the group The xx, reveals his soul in a solo album

“If I’m not just a third of The xx, who am I? » We can understand the little vertigo that seized Oliver Sim when tackling his first solo album. Since he was 15, this 33-year-old bassist and singer from London has been one with programmer-keyboardist Jamie Smith, known as “Jamie xx”, and singer and guitarist Romy Madley Croft, within The xx. From this complicity was born, from 2009 and the album xx, one of the most striking sound identities of contemporary pop. Out of this trio he always calls “ [son] heart, [sa] home », what did this elegant shy man have to say? Sumptuous, intimate, free from any complex, hideous bastard (released September 9) proves that Oliver Sim has solved this question in style.

Started just before the first confinement, the solo adventure first experienced a few hiccups. “ The result was pitiful, it went all over the place », the singer has fun today, joined by Zoom on July 10. By dint of errors, perseverance and writing, a guideline ends up taking shape. “ I noticed that the themes of fear and shame came up often », explains the one with the tall waist and chiseled features. “ I didn’t talk about it to flagellate myself, but to free myself, for an almost therapeutic purpose. »

feeling of shame

Majestic opening of this first album, the title hideous chooses to lay down the origin of this malaise in black and white. “ Been living with HIV/Since seventeen » (“I have been living with HIV since I was 17”), reveals Sim at the end of a song where romantic chords (borrowed from Lee Hazlewood) and pure electro intermingle. A confidence about his seropositivity which was built up in stages.

“ hideous was originally intended as a love letter to Jamie [Smith], he specifies. He knows all my facets, the worst and the best, but despite these ups and downs, he never stopped encouraging me. I don’t have to be so “hideous” if I deserve his friendship. » the laboratory worker, The xx sonic enginewho became a renowned producer and remixer (for Drake, Rihanna, Adele…), was the first member of the trio to express himself solo (In Color, in 2015). While Romy Madley Croft also completes a solo work, it was he who made hideous bastard, after pushing his accomplice to embark on this project. Before the scheduled reunion of the trio.

Over time, the tribute song to Jamie will turn into a compendium of reflections on the feelings of guilt and shame that inhabit the singer, until finally turning into a liberating coming-out. “At 17, I had the impression of brutally closing the doors of a world that had just opened up to me”, recalls Oliver Sim, explaining that this ordeal had made him more introspective, crushed by the weight of secrecy and his desire to hide his homosexuality.

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