Rick Astley talks before his gig at Forest Live: Angels really are on my side

His retirement in 1993 was meant to be for real. And when he re-emerged in 2007, he imagined it would be just for laughs and a few bob here and there. The last thing he expected was hitting number one on the album chart at the age of 50.

And yet the singer has led a charmed life. He only joined his band, FBI, because the singer had left for a career as a hairdresser. And he only came to the attention of Pete Waterman because he was working as a recording studio tea boy, or so the story goes.

“I don’t think anybody around me or anybody who knows me was expecting that, to have a number one album in the UK again. That was pretty freaky.”

Rick went to number one last year and has been riding the crest of a wave ever since. He’s played sold out shows across the UK and is back to headline Saturday’s Cannock Chase gig for Forest Live, with special guest Rumer.

He wasn’t particularly nervous about the release of 50. He had realistic expectations – that didn’t involve getting to number one. He hoped the record would be well promoted and that people would, a) get to hear it, and, b) enjoy it.

“In a lot of ways, no, really, there wasn’t any pressure. I didn’t have anything to be nervous about — because, like I said, we didn’t really have any expectations. I made this record myself in my own studio at home. I wrote it all, produced it, played all the instruments. It was a labour of love.

It’s been something I kind of wanted to do to mark my 50th birthday, which was this year, but obviously I was making the record last year. I didn’t anticipate anything fantastic happening. I just kind of thought, ‘Well, we’ll see how we can put the record out and we’ll see how it goes’.”

The most remarkable aspect of 50 was its sheer quality. A spiritual record, it was deeply soulful and rich in sound. Rick was happy with that aspect of it – and thrilled that it earned him a gold disc by selling more than a quarter of a million copies.

DEEPLY

“I think, for me, even as a small kid, I sang in choirs — at the church choir, school choir. They weren’t gospel choirs, that’s for sure, but the idea of singing with other people. When I was having Never Gonna Give You Up and a couple of the other hits, I wouldn’t have thought that deeply about certain lyrics, I don’t think, because they were pop songs — It was like, ‘girl meets boy, boom’, you know. Having lived a bit longer now, I think certain things that have happened in my life have definitely changed the way I feel about things.

“The song Angels On My Side is about the fact that I have two elder brothers and an older sister and they looked out for me a lot. My mum and dad got divorced – and obviously, my mum and dad looked after me – but I’m saying having older brothers and an older sister, that could have gone one of two ways. They could have neglected the youngest kid, and I don’t think they did. I think they looked after me. That’s happened right through my career, as well: I’ve had good people around me. I’ve still got most of my sanity. And I’ve still got some money, which is a freaky thing in this industry sometimes. When people have a pop career, they kind of get churned up and thrown out the other end, and they have a disastrous life sometimes after it. And I’ve had a charmed, amazing life.”

Rick had a testing childhood because his mum and dad lost a son before he was born and became very unhappy, before going their separate ways. That upbringing led him to music because he found his escape by singing.

“When you’re around two people who are very, very, very unhappy, i.e. your parents, it’s really tough – and that’s why I got into music, I think. I wanted to be at the school choir. I wanted to be at church, even though I wasn’t necessarily very religious. I just wanted to be somewhere else with people my own age and singing really helped me. One of the songs on the album is called Keep Singing, and that’s kind of, again, what that is about – that singing’s been good for me.”

And yet Rick didn’t imagine that he’d be as successful as he’s been. He certainly didn’t anticipate becoming a star in the USA, where Whenever You Need Somebody became a double platinum album.

“To be honest, having success in America, a couple number ones and a few top tens, you kind of think, ‘It doesn’t get any bigger than that’. But then again, I would look at other artists around my time — if you look at George Michael’s career through the 80s and into the 90s and stuff, I mean, it’s on a different league, a different level. Another British guy, obviously. So I think, to be fair, it was four or five years of being really famous. And I wouldn’t swap it for anything: It was an amazing experience, you know, because I made quite a lot of money. And I’m one of those people who actually wants to say that, because the way I look at the money side of it is that it bought me freedom. I’ve been free to do a lot of other things that I wanted to do. Nothing maybe too extravagant, but just freedom.”