Raye on the fight to release debut album My 21st Century Blues: ‘It’s been a real wild journey’
Raye is gaining her power back. Not just from the industry that made her feel “mediocre” for so many years, but over past traumas she kept bottled up for a long time.
“Some of my closest friends didn’t even know some of the stuff I’m discussing on my album,” she tells Sky News. “It’s probably the most honest I’ve been. It’s deep and it’s real.”
Raye, real name Rachel Keen, is only 25 but already a music industry veteran; a platinum-selling performer and a songwriter with credits for everyone from Charli XCX and Little Mix to John Legend and Beyonce.
She was just 15 when she released her first song and 17 when all her dreams came true, in the form of a four-album contract with record label Polydor. But after years of what seemed to be a successful career as a vocalist collaborating mainly on other artists’ dance hits, in 2021 she posted a string of tweets claiming the label was holding her back from releasing her own album.
“I’m done being a polite pop star,” she wrote, her frustration and anger palpable. The singer says after years of “trying to make it work”, she had reached the point where she had nothing to lose. “You get to that breaking point, really.”
Shortly after her tweets, it was announced she and Polydor were parting ways, with the label saying the decision had been “amicable and mutual” and wishing her “all the very best for the future”.
Raye claimed her first number one with Escapism at the beginning of 2023. Pic: Official Charts
Fast-forward 18 months or so and Raye is in a very different place; now an independent artist, earlier in January she topped the UK charts for the first time with viral hit Escapism. In February, the debut album she fought so hard to make, My 21st Century Blues, will finally be released. No longer pigeonholed or stifled, this is the real Raye, she says, and it’s been a long time coming.
“The album is discussing a lot of different topics… the deepest depths of really ugly stories about assaults and body dysmorphia and environmental anxiety. I think there’s no limit on what I’ve really spoken on in terms of my perspective on my blues as a woman in the 21st Century.”
‘It’s things I’ve been silent about for so long’
Always outspoken, Raye is not an artist who sticks to trotting out lines of approved PR-speak when she’s being interviewed, and this candidness is evident throughout her music. “Being real and transparent is really important to me, to skip out metaphors and similes and cut straight to the point of what I’m talking about,” she says. “Some of these things I haven’t also entirely healed from.
“It’s definitely going to be a rollercoaster for sure, but one that I’m making the decision to go on. That’s kind of the artist I like to be, transparent, honest. I think that’s what I’m like in real life.”
One song, Ice Cream Man, deals with sexual assault. “It’s things I’ve been silent about for so long and swallowed for so long and self-managed for so long in non-constructive ways,” she says.
“I’ve written pretty transparently about sexual violence… multiple things that occur in a life that you just bury, bury down, hide in a box, don’t tell anyone. And it just festers and manipulates itself into something quite ugly.”
As with Escapism, a dark electro banger about using alcohol, drugs and casual sex as coping mechanisms for dealing with emotional pain, the album is a contrast of often melancholy or dark lyrics, with beats that will fill a dance floor, as well as a range of genres.
“You’ve got songs with a contrasting sonic landscape,” she says. “I find it really exciting to tell a story and then the music feel the opposite so I think there’s a lot of juxtaposition there.”
Irony in its ‘most hilarious and ridiculous form’
Escapism’s success feels ironic to Raye. “With the previous music, not in a bad way, but it was more about the song than about the artist. The big dance songs or whatever, they don’t necessarily say anything about me as a person. I never necessarily wanted to be someone who did huge, huge hits, but without depth and substance or discussing things I’m passionate about, or breaking a couple of rules.
“Escapism is such a personal story. It’s kind of dark. It’s extremely explicit and honest and raw… I really told myself on the beginning of this next chapter, I’m not creating music with the intent or purpose to sell loads of copies, it’s about integrity and telling these uncomfortable stories that I think are really important.
“I had all the preparation in the world for building a small, steady fanbase bit by bit, and to not expect anything in terms of mainstream reflection. So this is like irony in its most hilarious and ridiculous form, that this is the biggest song of my entire career.”
Read more on Raye:
‘I was right to back myself’: Raye rises to first number one
Raye speaks out after leaving record label
Despite it not necessarily being the plan, she admits topping the charts does feel like vindication.
“[I feel] like anything is possible and I was right to back myself,” she says. “Never give up on your dreams. For someone who [felt] so, like, mediocre and… such a disappointment, actually, for so long, to just receive all the affirmation in the world that I was right to back my music is just…”
She doesn’t need to finish the sentence. “For someone who puts words together for a living, I don’t necessarily really have the best words to describe how crazy this is.”
‘Fear is the driving factor of secrets’
Emboldened, Raye says artists need to speak out more about the inner workings of the industry. And despite moves to improve diversity and equality making headlines in recent years, she says misogyny is still rife.
“We do need to be telling these stories more,” she says. “I think things that happen in the darkness have so much more power than they do when they’re brought out to the light, you know? Fear is the driving factor of secrets, and truths and stories being withheld. But there is still that very sad view that women need to be guided and controlled and taught and given instructions to follow and meet these requirements.”
She sighs. “I don’t know… I think it’s probably the same for all artists but especially for women, especially for everything I’ve witnessed in 10 years in the industry. I think a lot needs to change, but I don’t think anything will truly be equal and fair until we’ve got the same amount of female CEOs as we do male CEOs, we’ve got the same amount of female staff working a video shoot as male staff, the same amount of female A&Rs, and the same amount of, you know, different ethnicities in these same roles.
“Balance overall is so important, and until we have that, there’s always going to be issues and problems when you have men deciding what they think is best for women.”
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‘Seven years old, wide-eyed with a dream’: The album cover for My 21st Century Blues
Raye is looking to the future. She says she has had little communication with her former label bosses since she left, but wants to make it clear it wasn’t all bad. There were “some great people there who really believed in me… but obviously it came down to the big people making big decisions”, she says.
I ask her about the artwork for My 21st Century Blues; it features a little girl, dressed for the workplace but teetering in red stilettos hanging off her heels, standing atop a pile of instruments and recording equipment bearing the names of her songs, grabbing hands reaching out from inside. It feels poignant.
“That’s actually my baby sister on top of that big structure we built,” says Raye. “But that little girl up there is me, you know, seven years old, wide-eyed with a dream, not realising what the next 10 or 15 years of my life would be like.
“All the different life – in the industry and out of the industry – that I’ve had to navigate, process, understand, learn in my transition to being a woman, to being an artist, to being an independent artist. It’s been a real wild journey.”
Raye’s debut album, My 21st Century Blues, is out from 3 February
UK
Rishi Sunak apologises to infected blood scandal victims and says it is ‘day of shame for British state’
Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has offered a “wholehearted and unequivocal” apology to the victims of the infected blood scandal, saying it was a “day of shame for the British state”.
Mr Sunak said the findings of the Infected Blood Inquiry’s final report should “shake our nation to its core”, as he promised to pay “comprehensive compensation to those infected and those affected”, adding: “Whatever it costs to deliver this scheme, we will pay it.”
The report from the inquiry’s chair Sir Brian Langstaff blamed “successive governments, the NHS, and blood services” for failures that led to 30,000 people being “knowingly” infected with either HIV or Hepatitis C through blood products. Around 3,000 people have now died.
The prime minister said for any government apology to be “meaningful”, it had to be “accompanied by action”.
Politics live: Thatcher’s health secretary ‘disparaging’ to infected blood victims
Speaking in the Commons, Mr Sunak called it a “calamity”, saying the report showed a “decades-long moral failure at the heart of our national life”, as he condemned the actions of the NHS, civil service and ministers – “institutions in which we place our trust failed in the most harrowing and devastating way”.
The prime minister said they “failed this country”, adding: “Time and again, people in positions of power and trust had the chance to stop the transmission of those infections. Time and again, they failed to do so.
“I want to make a whole-hearted and unequivocal apology for this terrible injustice.”
Victims and campaigners outside Central Hall in Westminster.
Pic: PA
Keep up with all the latest news from the UK and around the world by following Sky News
Pointing to key findings in the report – from the destruction of documents through to failures over screening – Mr Sunak said there had been “layer upon layer of hurt endured across decades”.
He also apologised for the “institutional refusal to face up to these failings and worse, to deny and even attempt to cover them up”, adding: “This is an apology from the state to every single person impacted by this scandal.
“It did not have to be this way. It should never have been this way. And on behalf of this and every government stretching back to the 1970s, I am truly sorry.”
Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer also apologised for his party’s part in the scandal, telling the Commons: “I want to acknowledge to every single person who has suffered that in addition to all of the other failings, politics itself failed you.
“That failure applies to all parties, including my own. There is only one word, sorry.”
Read more:
100 faces of the infected blood scandal
Analysis: Report makes for difficult reading – but vindicates victims
The day as it happens as ‘chilling’ cover-up laid bare
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Infected blood victims ‘betrayed’ by NHS
In his report, released earlier on Monday, Sir Brian issued 12 recommendations – including an immediate compensation scheme and ensuring anyone who received a blood transfusion before 1996 was urgently tested for Hepatitis C.
He also called for compensation – something Mr Sunak said would come and would be outlined in the Commons on Tuesday.
But speaking to Sky News’ Sarah-Jane Mee, he warned the “disaster” of the scandal still wasn’t over, saying: “More than 3,000 have died, and deaths keep on happening week after week.
“I’d like people to take away the fact that this is not just something which happened. It is happening.”
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Inquiry chair Sir Brian Langstaff spoke to Sky’s Sarah-Jane Mee.
Sir Brian said what had happened to the victims was “no accident”, adding: “People put their trust in the doctors and the government to keep them safe. That trust was betrayed.
“And then the government compounded the agony by repeatedly saying that no wrong had been done.”
But he hoped the report would ensure “these mistakes are not repeated”.
He told Sky News: “We don’t want another 30,000 people to go into hospital and come out with infections which were avoidable, which are life-shattering, which were no accident.
“And we don’t want the government to end up being defensive about them – but instead to be candid [and] forthcoming in the ways which I’ve just suggested.”
An inquiry into the infected blood scandal has pointed the finger at several people and organisations after more than 30,000 patients were “knowingly” infected with HIV or Hepatitis C.
Inquiry chair Sir Brian Langstaff said the “disaster was not an accident” and there was a “catalogue of failures” and a “pervasive” cover-up by the NHS and successive governments.
More than 30,000 Britons were infected with HIV and Hepatitis C after being given contaminated blood products in the 1970s and 1980s.
About 3,000 people died as a result, while many more still live under the shadow of health problems, debilitating treatments and stigma.
Follow live: Updates on infected blood report
Speaking after the report was published on Monday following the seven-year inquiry, Sir Brian said: “The damage caused was compounded by the reaction of successive governments, the NHS and the medical profession.
“Successive governments refused to admit responsibility to save face and expense.
“Today’s report also found that the response to the infections made things worse, including repeated failures by governments and the NHS to acknowledge the victims should not have been infected in the first place.”
In the report, he named specific people and institutions in his criticism.
They included:
Lord Clarke
Kenneth Clarke, now a lord, was heavily criticised by Sir Brian.
He was a health minister in Margaret Thatcher’s government from 1982 to 1985, then health secretary from 1988 to 1990.
Ken Clarke was later John Major’s chancellor. Pic: PA
Lord Clarke was accused of being “somewhat blasé” when he gave evidence to the inquiry about the collection of blood from prisoners as late as 1983.
His manner was described as “argumentative”, “unfairly dismissive” and “disparaging” towards those who have suffered, with Sir Brian saying he played “some part” in that suffering.
The report said it was “regrettable that he could not moderate his natural combative style in expressing views”.
Sky News has approached Lord Clarke for comment.
Read more: 100 faces of infected blood scandal
Inquiry chairman Sir Brian Langstaff with victims and campaigners. Pic: PA
The Thatcher government
Margaret Thatcher, as well as subsequent governments and health secretaries, continually said infections were “inadvertent” and patients were given “the best treatment available on the then current medical advice”.
The inquiry report concluded that was not true and said the factual basis for the claim was unclear.
“In short, adopting the line amounted to blindness,” the report said.
“Adopting it without realising it needed to have a proper evidential base, and they did not know what it was, was unacceptable.
“The line, which was wrong from the very outset, then became entrenched for around 20 years: a dogma became a mantra.
“It was enshrined. It was never questioned.”
Margaret Thatcher. Pic: PA
Sir Brian added that the Thatcher government “did not respond appropriately, urgently and proactively” to the risks of Hepatitis C and HIV transmissions through blood.
He said the government knew there was a much higher incidence of Hepatitis in prisoners, yet “no action” was taken to stop blood donations from them, which “increased the risk of transmission”.
The failure lied “principally at the door” of the health departments in Westminster and Scotland, he said.
He said the Thatcher government signed up to recommendations in 1983 from the Council of Europe to inform clinicians and patients about the risks of treatment – yet failed to follow those recommendations.
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Infected blood scandal ‘no accident’
Sir Brian described the failure to provide any guidance to doctors about the risk of transmission of AIDS as “inexcusable”.
On compensation, he also said the Thatcher government “plainly formed the view, at an early stage, that nothing had been done wrong, and that no financial assistance would be provided to people with bleeding disorders who had been infected with HIV”.
He added: “It did so without any proper investigation either into what had caused the infections or into the appalling plight of those infected.”
Treloar School
Haemophiliac children were sent to the Hampshire school with an on-site NHS clinic so they could live as near a normal childhood as possible.
Instead, 75 boys died of AIDs and Hepatitis – and 58 were infected but survived – as they were included in secret trials to test a blood product called Factor 8, which was made with blood farmed from prisoners, sex workers and drug addicts in America.
The report said there “is no doubt” the risks of virus transmission were well known to doctors at Treloar School, yet doctors “played down the risks”.
Treloar students from the 1970s and 1980s at the inquiry. Pic: PA
Some pupils and parents were “never informed” by the school the boys had tested positive for HIV, which Sir Brian said “was unconscionable”.
Treloar School was a “microcosm” of much of “what went wrong in the way haemophilia clinicians treated their patients across the UK,” he added.
The school said in a statement: “We are devastated that some of our former pupils were so tragically affected and hope that the findings provide some solace for them and their families.”
It added that its management was “absolutely committed to exploring” calls for a public memorial to those affected, and added: “We’ll now be taking the time to reflect on the report’s wider recommendations.”
Alder Hey Children’s Hospital
The hospital was the main site in Liverpool for children with bleeding disorders from the late 1970s onwards.
Doctors used Factor 8 concentrate containing contaminated blood to treat them, even after other haemophilia centres stopped using them on children, Sir Brian found.
Alder Hey’s director from the mid-1970s, Dr John Martin, “did not regard the risk of Hepatitis as a reason to alter any treatment regime”, the report added.
“He exposed them to wholly unnecessary risks,” it said.
Sky News has approached Alder Hey for comment.
Alder Hey Children’s Hospital in Liverpool. Pic: PA
Professor Arthur Bloom
Professor Bloom, who died in 1992, was one of the country’s leading haemophiliac specialists during the period and treated some of those who were affected.
Sir Brian Langstaff said he “must bear some of the responsibility for the UK’s slowness in responding to the risks of AIDs to people with haemophilia”.
Prof Bloom said at the time he was unaware of any proof linking infections to the blood products and said there was no need to change patients’ treatment, Sir Brian said.
He added: “Disastrously the Department of Health and Social Security was over-influenced by his advice, in particular his advice to continue importing commercial factor concentrates.”
Professor Arthur Bloom
The NHS
Sir Brian said the response of the NHS and the government showed there was not a major plot to cover up failures “in an orchestrated conspiracy to mislead”.
“But in a way that was more subtle, more pervasive and more chilling in its implications,” he said.
“To save face and to save expense, there has been a hiding of much of the truth.”
He also found patients were knowingly exposed to unacceptable risks of infection, with transfusions frequently given when not clinically needed.
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‘Day of shame for the British state’
The report also said there was no contact tracing exercise carried out when Hepatitis C screenings were introduced.
Sir Brian also said the NHS and governments repeatedly failed to acknowledge people should not have been infected, despite the scandal being known about.
Prime Minister Rishi Sunak on Monday offered a “wholehearted and unequivocal” apology to victims and said it was a “day of shame for the British state”.
He said the findings of the inquiry should “shake our nation to its core” and promised to pay “comprehensive compensation to those infected and those affected.”
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Labour: ‘There was systemic failure’
The NHS said in a statement on its website: “Since September 1991, all blood donated in the UK is screened using very rigorous safety standards and testing to protect both donors and patients.
“Since screening was introduced, the risk of getting an infection from a blood transfusion or blood products is very low.”
UK
Infected blood report will give survivors some satisfaction – but prosecutions must wait for another day
Of all the survivors of this scandal I have spoken to, the key demand they have from this inquiry is accountability.
They want the organisations and individuals who contributed to this scandal to be clearly identified, held to account and – where evidence is sufficient – prosecuted.
The inquiry report clearly identifies where the fault lies.
Live updates:
Infected blood scandal report latest
Organisations like the Department of Health and the NHS are singled out for their failure to prevent the infection of tens of thousands of individuals in the first place.
It goes on to implicate them in the denial, delay and a clear attempt at “hiding the truth”.
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Infected blood victims ‘betrayed’ by NHS, says inquiry chair
Then there are the committees, such as the Committee on Safety of Medicines.
The inquiry finds it should never have approved potentially infected blood products for use in the NHS given what was known at the time, let alone what came to light as people began to die as a result of receiving them.
Individuals are clearly identified too, many of them now deceased; the directors of the UK’s blood transfusion centres who failed to act on warnings about the safety of our domestic blood supply.
Hundreds of individual doctors also failed to recognise the risk to their patients, were slow to test them for illnesses then inform them of the results, and in some cases used them in clinical trials for medicines known to be risky that led to some dying unnecessarily.
Read more:
The stories behind 100 victims
‘I gave my young son to his killers’
Infections are ‘worst thing you can imagine’
Keep up with all the latest news from the UK and around the world by following Sky News
Clarke singled out
Senior civil servants and ministers are singled out also.
Kenneth, now Baron, Clarke – who was health minister between 1982 and 1985 – comes in for specific criticism.
Inquiry chair Sir Brian Langstaff said it was “indefensible” that the government’s position in 1983 was that there was “no conclusive proof” of the risk of HIV to the UK blood supply and blood products.
There will be some satisfaction for survivors that so many organisations and individuals are criticised. But when it comes to legal culpability, and the prospect of prosecutions, they must wait for another day.
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Inquiries can’t find criminal responsibility
Under the Inquiries Act, public inquiries are prohibited from finding criminal or civil liability.
If any prosecutions are to come from this report, it will be through the courts.
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