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Ellie Goulding: I turned to drink to appear more interesting to fans

Singer Ellie Goulding performs at half time of an NFL football game between the Buffalo Bills and Dallas Cowboys in Arlington, Texas, Thursday, Nov. 28, 2019. (AP Photo/Michael Ainsworth)
Ellie Goulding felt under pressure to appear fun (Credit: AP)

Ellie Goulding has revealed she used to drink before interviews to try and make herself seem more fun.

The Burn singer insisted she wasn’t a big drinker but admitted she turned to alcohol to cope with the pressure of putting on a public persona - including at Radio 1 Live Lounge performances, which are often recorded in the morning.

Goulding, 32, told Fearne Cotton’s Happy Place podcast: “I had to be a fake person to deal with the surreal situation I was in. Usually for me it involved alcohol. I assumed I couldn’t be good enough, smart, funny, or crazy enough to be with certain people without it.

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PARIS, FRANCE - SEPTEMBER 30: Ellie Goulding wears earrings, a hi-neck white jacket with red and white print, outside Stella McCartney , during Paris Fashion Week - Womenswear Spring Summer 2020, on September 30, 2019 in Paris, France. (Photo by Edward Berthelot/Getty Images)
Ellie Goulding at Paris Fashion Week in September 2019 (Credit: Getty Images)

“Live Lounges used to be most nerve-wracking, I even drank before those, I swear to God. I would say, ‘Right, I’ve got to drink this morning because I’ve got this interview and I don’t really know how to answer the questions, because I don’t really know who I am any more’.

“I thought drinking would at least make me a bit more funny, or interesting. I wasn’t an alcoholic. I could go months without a drink too.”

The Love Me Like You Do singer - who married art dealer Caspar Jopling in August this year - also confessed she was not able to be herself during her celebrity relationships with DJ Greg James and McFly’s Dougie Poynter.

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LONDON, ENGLAND - FEBRUARY 20:  Ellie Goulding (L) and Dougie Poynter attend Dame Vivienne Westwood and James Jagger's Mad Max party in aid of climate change during London Fashion Week February 2017 at Fabric on February 20, 2017 in London, England.  (Photo by David M. Benett/Dave Benett/Getty Images)
Ellie Goulding dated Dougie Poynter between 2014 and 2016 (Credit: Getty Images)

Goulding said: “I didn’t know who I was. I was in relationships but I felt like I needed to have someone because I wasn’t close to my family.

“I had this job taking me around the world, that was forcing me to be in the spotlight every day, to be talked about, so I always needed someone. But I wasn’t really me. So anyone I was close to, I don’t want to say it wasn’t real, but it wasn’t what it should have been. I regret that, but it was my survival.”