Jessie Ware has nailed the off-duty popstar look. Cosy yet commanding in her jumper and glasses, and Zooming from a Glasgow hotel bed between shows, it's clear the singer is buzzing from life on tour.
We’re speaking a few days before the climax of her That! Feels Good! shows, in support of this year’s Mercury-nominated album of the same name, with two headline shows at Ally Pally. More than a decade after her first Mercury nod, Ware is busier than ever.
There’s the “beautiful warmth” and community of the tour; her venture into TV – she is a judge on ITV talent show Mamma Mia: I Have a Dream, which is searching for new stars for the West End production of Mamma Mia! – and, of course, Table Manners, the podcast where she, her mum, and special guests from Kylie to Nigella set the world to rights over a home-cooked meal.
“The podcast has given me the confidence to be the musician, then I’m on this ITV show – it’s exciting, it’s new. And I'm taking these experiences and chances because for the majority of my early career, I was kind of waiting for time to run out. But this is happening! This is amazing. Let's enjoy this!”
To top it off, she’s a mum to three young kids and a certified “mother” to the LGBTQ+ community. “I'm honoured," the 39-year-old says. "And it makes me laugh. And I love it. And I'm appreciative of it. Most of all, it's fun. It's very, very fun!”
Dubbed “the thinking man’s pop singer” by GQ, she reinvented herself in the pandemic with character-driven disco album What’s Your Pleasure? - a change from the ballads and “sad mum songs” of her prior decade.
Ware’s first two albums – Devotion and Tough Love – were staples of the early 2010s soul-pop-electronica wave, as well as critical and commercial hits. Glasshouse in 2017 marked a more challenging period, as the British ballad trendreceded and Ware was pregnant with her first child.
The promotional campaign left her disillusioned with the music industry, and she created Table Manners that year, as “not an exit”, necessarily, “but another outlet”. After baring her soul on tracks like Alone and Say You Love Me, penned by longtime collaborator Ed Sheeran, Ware found sanctuary at her mum’s kitchen table.
The runaway success of the podcast has paved the way for her “flamboyant, creative” alter egos, she says. “It’s allowed me to be more character driven within my music." On tour, Jessie Ware is international pop superstar Mother of Pearl, and a host of other characters on stage at the Pearl Club.
Te contrast to that is her “childhood kitchen table” with her mum, where “we're talking about incredibly normal, everyday things, but with extraordinary people… there's something incredibly levelling about that.”
Ware is leaning into the joy of the disco diva after her angstier career beginnings. She is having fun with fashion these days, leaning into the “grandeur and the drama” and the fabulous outfits (there is a tinge of Carry On sauciness in the whip-cracking What’s Your Pleasure?). The “beautiful balance” of her careers means she can fully indulge in the ultra-glam popstar persona and her chatty, accessible hosting gigs (like “‘talking about being a chubby kid” on TableManners).
“On tour, I have a wonderful team that makes me feel like a superstar,” she says, “and I've really had to grow into that. We've all got character names and costume changes on stage. Whereas if you look at my last bloody Instagram video [of the podcast] it was Matt Lucas, I'm in no makeup”.
Ware draws a firm boundary between her public persona and real life. “I like to think that I'm incredibly open,” she says, but “there are sacred things that I will keep private”. The security of her personal life lets her “relish” the life of an international popstar, and the fact that “it’s completely not normal”.
The industry has transformed since she cracked the charts, and so has Ware. “I kind of don't give a shit anymore! I'm still being discovered, which is so wild and fun. I'm just having a wonderful time. And I think people can see that.”
With her slightly prickly self-deprecation, Ware has described her younger self as “prudish”, and her earlier output as “sad mum songs” – though she is definitely proud of them. “Look, for me, I was not very comfortable with my body for a long time. And I've become more and more comfortable with my body as I've got older, which is a wonderful, empowering feeling. It's different from how it was when I started in the industry – there's far more body positivity, and that's welcomed. And I'm really thankful for that.”
The singer’s blend of authenticity, self-acceptance, and gleeful innuendo have won a rapturous LGBTQ+ audience; she headlined this year’s West Hollywood Pride, and Homobloc in Manchester. And of course, she is ‘mother’.
What does the accolade mean to her? “I think it means we have a connection, we have an understanding. I feel so loved, I feel so adored, but in a way that we could go have a drink together. And I so appreciate that generosity.”
Speaking of motherhood, her children will finally see the tour when it wraps up this weekend. “I think it's important for them to see why I go away, and what my job is,” she says after a month on the road. “It’s a very bizarre job. But it's the best in the world and it's fun”.
She does fret that they’ll be bored – “I'll be lucky if I get them through the first costume change!” – but the doubts seem unfounded. Jessie Ware may be many things, but boring is not one of them.
