Craig David speaks of success ahead of Castle Park gig

I’m confused and reply: “Wednesday, I think,”

“Ha, a Wednesday, that will be interesting.”

Which is when I finally twig the Seven Days reference, and congratulate her on the joke.

As it turns out, his PR re-arranges our interview because Craig is busy on Wednesday (of course he is), and moves it one day forward to Tuesday - much better for everyone.

Obviously I do not recall this story to Craig, guessing, he’s heard it all before.

But then Craig has done it all before. He had an incredible career, starting at the insane age of just 16, singing in clubs and then getting picked by producers Artful Dodger to sing Re-Wind in 1999 at the age of 18. Reaching number two in the charts, that catapulted him from the R n B and UK Garage scene well and truly into the mainstream.

Since then he has released six studio albums and worked with a variety of artists such as Tinchy Stryder, Kano, Jay Sean, Rita Ora and Sting. He has 20 UK top 40 singles, and seven UK top 40 albums, selling more than 14 million solo records worldwide.

But despite his huge initial success, it appeared to be all coming to an end when his single Officially Yours in 2008 reached a meagre 158 in the UK charts. A few months later the release of his Greatest Hits album gave the impression he was bowing out of the industry for good.

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Fast forward another ten years and his sixth studio album, Following My Intuition, released in 2016, went straight to number one in the UK Album Charts. It was his second to reach the top spot since Born To Do It at the turn of the millennium.

He says: “Its little things happening along the way. I remember how it was the first time round, things tend to go to the right places when you don’t overthink it. Life doesn’t always go like A, B, C. You’ve got to be adaptable.

“I had a viral song from the 1Xtra Live Studio with MistaJam and Kurupt FM; then meeting Big Narstie and working with him. Next thing I do a Live Lounge of Justin Beiber’s Love Yourself and that goes viral, I was seeing Diplo and Justin Beiber hitting me up, and Skrillex as well. I couldn’t have written that.

“Also people I was working with at that time were quite unknown, like Blonde and Sigala. Six to eight months later those people were having huge hits. I always know that if I’ve got lyrics that draw you in, I could work with any producer that is current and fresh for a modern sound.”

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So does it feel any different second time around?

“The hunger for the music never went away,” he tells me, “but may be there’s a different approach now, slowing things down.

“Do you know what, I’d been writing songs and performing from so young. I had so much energy and just wanted to go, go, go. Even with the magnitude of going from club shows at places like KoKo, which at the time was called Camden Palace, the next thing I was in arenas and I wanted to keep going. It was all about the next tune.

“It was so constant that creatively I got to a point where I was wasn’t sure what I was writing about. I didn’t want to write about being on planes and travelling to places. I felt like I need to live life.

“I had bought a place in Miami along the way and ended up spending more time there and just enjoying it. The silver lining out there was when I started to get past the sun and the lifestyle, there was the club scene.

“For me the elitist VIP thing of supposedly being more special than those outside, I hated that. So I started throwing these house parties in TS5, which was my apartment. Little did I know what that would lead to.”

Starting with uploading the sets to SoundCloud, he soon teamed up with Kiss FM to broadcast the live DJ sets every Sunday.

Now he’s spending the summer playing a mixture of his TS5 shows, including an Ibiza residency, alongside super huge full band shows at parks and grounds across the country.

“I did a lot of festivals with TS5 and the crowds seemed to be a lot younger,” Craig adds, “and then I’ve seen now that at the shows there’s such a cross section of teenagers, older brothers and sisters and mum and dad as well. Everyone is getting off to the same tunes, it’s amazing.

“I had so many songs on my laptop that had no outlet because I wasn’t signed and I didn’t have a way to put it out there like I wanted to. I just kept my head down and kept writing songs and then all of a sudden the opportunity came and I was so ready for it.”

“Miami was a great place for a holiday, but it wasn’t a great place to produce music,” he explains.

“Being from the UK, it was hard to be out there. So I moved back, and it’s been game changing.”

That ‘game changing’ moment Craig talks about began with a set at Glastonbury. He was given one of the event’s smaller stages – but was stunned when 20,000 people came to see him. He feels like he has now gone back to his roots.

“It was so nice to be able to just make the music in the same vein as I did,” he says.

“It felt like I was in touch. I’ve just got back to making music and not worrying about the outcome - just going to the studio and having fun, like I did back in the day.

“That’s what I love about TS5. It’s what I was doing as a kid, creating mix-tapes, taking a box of records to the clubs and playing them to the crowds.

“I’m just so grateful that I’m doing what I love and have had such great memories.

“I remember at the Brit Awards one year Elton John saying if there was a better singer in the UK than me, he was Margaret Thatcher and then U2 playing One and flowing it into Walking Away. Whatever happens from here on in, I’ll always have those incredible memories.”

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Craig David plays Colchester’s Castle Park on Sunday, June 2, with support from top international DJ Sigala. Gates open at 4.30pm and for tickets go to colchester-events.co.uk