has discussed what it was like being overweight when he was growing up, saying that when he was younger, the girls were interested in ‘the captain of the football team’.
The 40-year-old Seven Days hitmaker revealed that by the time he got to about 14 years old he weighed 14.5st and need to ‘rein’ it in for his health.
Speaking to Dragon’s Den investor Steven Bartlett on his, Craig said: ‘The being overweight thing, now I see it as actually in hindsight it brought out so many wonderful things that had been repressed for a long time.
‘But at the time, the social standing was you need to look a certain way, the captain of the school football team tended to be the one that the girls were interested in, you were the slightly overweight one that they’d cry on your shoulder and tell them your problems.
‘You’d have this real empathic relationship, it would be like this connection, but they didn’t want to take it any further than that. He’s the one – look at how he scored the goal.
‘So you’ve got this early imprint of what society expects of you, and then you try and start to conform to that.
‘So there were periods when I’d be walking down the high street and I’d be looking in the glass, the reflection in the glass and I’d just be like, you’re just feeling sorry for yourself, feeling like the jeans ain’t fitting quite right and the jacket is not, and you’re getting bigger sizes, and I was feeling like – I’m doing all the fitness! I could run, I had some legs on me – so I can move but I was just carrying a lot of weight.
‘But not unhealthy, I think there was a point when it became unhealthy and I was 15, no, I was 14, and my weight had got to 14.5st so I was starting to get to over my age in weight and I was thinking maybe I need to rein this in a little bit health-wise.’
Later on in the conversation, Craig – that saw celebrities recounting lyrics from the Beatles’ hit Help! – said that ‘everyone has a six-pack underneath’, even if it’s not currently visible!
‘By the way, everyone has a six-pack underneath – that’s the saving grace for everyone. Don’t care about the fat content, there’s a six-pack underneath for everyone, so walk out in the street and feel confident about that.’
Elsewhere in the chat, he touched on his relationship with women, saying that he wants to apologise to women who tried to open his heart when he was younger, revealing that his first heartbreak left him struggling to find love.
He said: ‘My heart was so open, I had that first heartbreak and it just went from a kid with his heart open, to all of a sudden it just crashed.
‘I had never felt anything like that before. After my early childhood sweetheart break-up, my heart kind of closed down.
He continued: ‘I feel open enough to be apologetic for relationships my heart was closed for. I feel sorry for the girls and women in the latter stage of my life who tried to open my heart up.’
Craig recentlyafter focusing onhis career over the decades.
Speaking to Metro.co.uk at , Craig said: ‘The one thing that I would say, if I was to take away from my whole career, that I am doing now, is that I’ve just become more playful. I’ve actually become that same playful trade that was making that first album.
‘I’m a perfectionist at the best of times, but to simplify my life and to enjoy the relationships, enjoy the friendships, enjoy the people in my life, because those are the things that you remember over a period of time, and I do music. Music is in my heart, like, that’s what I do. So, I don’t think of that as, “Oh, when are you gonna, how long are you gonna do music for?” I do this.’
