Rag’n’Bone Man FAULT Magazine cover shoot and interview

Rag’n’Bone Man X FAULT Magazine

Words: Fabio Magnocavallo
Photography: Fiona Garden
Photographer’s Assistant: Ben Ashton
Styling: Tanja Martin
Styling Assistant: Ania Egan
Grooming: Sara Bowden

With more than nine billion global streams, two back-to-back No. 1 studio LPs, and the UK’s fastest-selling male debut album of the last decade, it’s fair to say that Rag’n’Bone Man has come a long way since being crowned the winner of the BRITs Critics Choice in 2017.

With one of the most distinctive voices and no stranger to touring life, the East Sussex-born singer, real name Rory Charles Graham, has been enjoying a busy 2024 so far. From supporting Shania Twain and collaborator P!nk to performing on the festival circuit, Rag’n’Bone Man is gearing up to unleash his third studio album, What Do You Believe In?, on October 18th. From November, he will perform on his headline tour across Europe. 

In the meantime, while fans patiently wait for the anticipated release, the 39-year-old music chart-topper arrives with ‘Rush Of Blood’, three months after opening a new era with the soulful album title track. Hot from being crowned BBC Radio 1’s Hottest Record in the World and being chosen to perform the song at the Olympics Team GB homecoming in Manchester, ‘Rush Of Blood’ takes major inspiration from the disco and funk era from the 1970s and ‘80s and hears Rag’n’Bone Man pick up the pace on an adrenaline-fueled banger.

During an exclusive interview with FAULT, we find out about the inspiration behind the track, how the rest of the album compares, and the biggest pinch-me moment of his career so far.

FAULT: Your new single, ‘Rush Of Blood’, is the second single from your upcoming album. What inspired you to write it? I read that it came about by accident at the last minute.

Rag’n’Bone Man: I don’t usually do this with my songs. Usually, I start with lyrics and an idea but it was just one of those days where we had already written a song for the album called ‘Wreckage’. I think we just had too much fucking coffee or something. Everyone was just a bit hyped up. I had been listening to a lot of ‘70s and ‘80s disco, funk music. I’m a big Rick James fan, Heatwave, and Sly and the Family Stone. I wondered what a Rag’n’Bone Man song would sound like with that backdrop. It was more about getting the vibe right and then filling the gaps. I feel like the song ended up just being a feeling of working all week and then looking forward to Friday and going to the club. Or like when I was 16, I couldn’t wait to go to the rave on Saturday, but everything else building up to that was so shit that I feel like I swallowed it, but in that moment you feel a sense of euphoria. The chorus is the euphoria you feel when you’re in that feeling of a rush. I was also thinking about how the song would fit into a live show when making it. I think nowadays more than ever, I’m aware of my live show being just a little bit too slow. 

If your fans loved the two Calvin Harris tracks, they will love this one!

Yeah. It’s dancey without trying to be house. Essentially, it’s disco.

Did working with Calvin on those songs influence this one?

I think it was playing the Calvin songs live and seeing what the pace of those songs does to the crowd that definitely inspired it. Maybe not the songs themselves, but definitely the way that people react to the songs. It made me think, ‘I want another one of those.’

You’ve had a number of songs that have gone on to be mini phenomena by entering people’s lives and taking on a new meaning. Even songs like ‘Skin’, which is considered a sad song, have also made people feel good.

I was always surprised about songs like ‘Skin’ uplifting people. It will surprise me when I go to different places. I’ll play ‘Skin’ here [in the UK] and people will recognise it but if I play it in Paris, people go fucking mental because it was a huge hit. If I play it in Amsterdam, people go crazy. 

We’ve heard two songs from the new album so far. How are the other songs sounding?

It’s quite eclectic but at the same time, it has more of a feeling of hip-hop than anything I’ve done for a while. Probably since my Wolves EP in 2014. I did this one song with Jamie Lidell called ‘The Right Way’; it’s the first track on the record. We made a song by sampling our own instruments. We laid a bunch of stuff together, recorded it, put it into a sample machine, played it at a different speed, came up with our samples, and then played on top of that. It sounded a bit hip-hop and neo-soul together, and I love the way it made me feel. I was searching for the right people to work with. There’s a guy called OAK (Oak Felder) who produced some stuff for Alicia Keys and Miguel. He’s fully immersed in that R&B, hip-hop style. We worked together on a lot of the album. I also worked with Rob Milton. The album feels a lot more sunny than anything I’ve ever done. I felt like I had the motivation early on so everything was on purpose. The songs came about the way they did over whatever subject, but throughout everything, it felt like an uplifting record instead of making people cry. There are a few of those moments, but for the most part, it’s a feel-good record.  

A lot of people often say that writing happy songs is a challenge. I guess you didn’t have that issue for this album.

I found it hard to write sad songs! When you can’t get to that place, where else do you go? You have to be a bit more outside the box. It’s not necessarily about happy, it’s about getting to that moment that makes you feel uplifted.

You titled the album after the lead single, ‘What Do You Believe In?’ Was there a particular reason for that?

It’s just a very important question that I was asking myself when I wrote that song. After losing my mum and having four children at home, I was speaking openly about religion. I’m not necessarily atheist but I’m not a religious person. I wasn’t brought up that way. When you know you’re about to lose someone, there’s a part of you that wants to know, ‘What do you believe in?’ or ‘Is there somewhere else someone goes when they die?’ or you want to believe that because you want that someone to have an afterlife or somewhere else to go and be with other people. Whatever the reason, that’s the way I would try to explain to my children, whether I believe it or not. So that was why. Also, I thought it was open-ended. People can make of it what they want. 

During the making of your last album, Life by Misadventure, you said you wrote songs for your son, Reuben, but decided to scrap all but one because you didn’t think they were good enough. Can your children expect any songs about them on this one?

There aren’t any direct songs about my children, but their voices are on the record. The album opens with them talking. We asked them what love meant to them. It was just a really sweet honest answer from from the two little ones. One said, ‘When you when you hug and kiss someone,’ and then the other one said, ‘It means when you’re being with your family.’ I was like, ‘Oh, that’s a pretty honest answer.’ It was a video where I took the audio of it, and I just put it on the the beginning of the album. I thought it’d be nice.

Going into your second album, did you feel any pressure after your debut performed so well?

I knew with the second album that it wasn’t going to be as poppy, which was almost on purpose. I had a lot of shit to get off my chest on the second record. I wasn’t constructed in any way, it was just my thoughts. I’m still really proud of it but it’s a bit more miserable, to be honest.

The industry had changed quite a bit between your first and second album too.

Not just the industry, but the world had changed. When I put my second album out, COVID was happening. Everyone was like, ‘What the fuck do we do?’ You couldn’t do the things you were able to do before. You couldn’t go to France or Dubai or Switzerland or wherever. Now we’re back in the real world, even though it’s a scary fucking world right now, you are able to do promo all over. I also think this is a better album to do that with than the last.

Having achieved so much in your career already, what has been a pinch-me moment?

Winning an Ivor Novello [award] was mad. It’s pretty prestigious. To be honest, being on stage with P!nk was probably the most emotional experience I’ve had in my career so far. [‘Anywhere Away from Here’] is one of my favourite songs I’ve ever written. The fact that I got her to do the collaboration in the first place was amazing for me. But then when she asked if I wanted to sing that song on her set in front of 80,000 people. I never actually thought that would happen. I don’t know how I actually composed myself on stage because I cried quite a lot afterwards. It was so emotional. All my family was there, my dad, sister, girlfriend, my kids. 

What is your FAULT?

I feel like I’m very bad at coming back to reality when I’ve been working for a long time. I spend a lot of time on my own. It can sometimes seem from videos and stuff that we’re always having fun, but when the shows are finished and not much is happening, my world is a hotel room most of the time because it’s hectic and I need peace and quiet but at the same time, that makes me come home and really fear social situations. I feel I need to get better at dealing with real life. It can feel like I’ve missed out on stuff too, especially with the kids. 

‘Rush of Blood’, the new single by Rag’n’Bone Man, is out today.
His third studio album, What Do You Believe In?, drops 18th October via Columbia Records

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