Matt Cardle became the seventh winner of ITV's 'X Factor' in 2010, and has since become one of the show's biggest success stories.
With his third studio album 'Porcelain' set for release at the end of this month, and a new single out at the end of this week, we spoke to Matt about what to expect from his new music, his recent performance to over a billion people and this year's 'X Factor'.
Tell us a little bit about your new album 'Porcelain'.
It's my third, it's been a long time coming. It's spilled over from both albums really, I've learnt so many lessons from 'Letters' and 'The Fire'. I'm even more involved in the making of it this time with regards to playing the instruments and the track and the drums and the bass and all this kind of thing. It's a little all over the place really. We started writing it in LA, some's been written in Canada, some in New York and the rest in the UK. It's one of those things - the second album was very much documenting the breakdown of my relationship but this is a much more positive step forward - it's a more positive album. There's a lot of different styles on the album and I've been writing with loads of different artists and soul artists, and R&B to get a few of those flavours on the album - Brian McKnight is a huge R&B and soul star in the US. Obviously we've got the track with Mel C on there which is a bit different so yeah - I've been pushing myself as hard as I could this time with vocals and that, trying to get something new for the fans.
Why did you choose 'When You Were My Girl' as your second single?
We just thought it'd be a good way to go after the Mel C track - it was pop but it was quite melancholy in a way. 'When You Were My Girl' is a bit more straight up the line than that.
How was the experience of collaborating with Melanie C?
It was great - Mel's an absolute legend and it was an honour to be able to work with her and her voice is just getting better and better and better, and her as an artist as well - those things come around and very seldom do they work so I'm just happy we got one that worked.
You recently performed at the Miss World Final to a global audience of over one billion people - how did you find that experience?
It was a little bit reminiscent of 'X Factor' - a big stage, studios, lots of people watching - but this time there was a lot more, and just being distracted by all the most beautiful women on the planet which was pretty fun.
Have you been watching this year's 'X Factor'?
I haven't yet because I literally haven't stopped. I've been to-ing and fro-ing from the States and then going to Bali, so I haven't actually been able to see it yet, is it any good?
There's a new twist - with six chairs at 'Boot Camp' - the judges can choose six contestants to go through and sit on the chairs, but they can also boot those sat down out if someone better comes along.
That's brutal! That's really brutal!
So have you got any advice for contestants going into live shows this weekend?
Yeah, just try and relax as much as possible. Get some time to yourself before you go on and enjoy it. Whatever happens make sure you enjoy it.
Do you still keep in touch with anyone from your series?
Yeah I still keep in touch with Dannii (Minogue) and Aiden (Grimshaw) and Dannii's manager. I speak to the boys from One Direction if they ever stop for two seconds!
Have you got any upcoming tour dates that you can tell us about?
I can't tell you about any at the moment because we haven't finalised them, but we will be touring and also internationally next year.
New single 'When You Were My Girl' is due for release October 13, with the full album 'Porcelain' coming out on October 28.
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