By Jon Wilde
Last updated at 1:25 AM on 16th January 2011
The 20-year-old singer on making it on her own, being a feral child and why nearly dying was good for her creativity
'Self-sufficiency is vitally important to my self-respect,' said Coco Sumner
The children of famous musicians don’t always have it easy; for every Norah Jones there are a few dozen Julian Lennons. Coco Sumner is hoping to buck the trend.
The daughter of Sting and Trudie Styler, she is painfully shy and self-effacing in person, but those qualities belie a fierce determination to make it on her own terms. Growing up on the family’s Wiltshire estate, she showed an early aptitude for music.
She has just released her debut album, The Constant, with her band I Blame Coco, and a single, Turn Your Back On Love, is out on February 7. Now 20, she divides her time between London and Wiltshire.
Having a superstar dad hasn’t helped in any way.
Being Sting’s daughter hasn’t kicked any doors open for me – he has had absolutely nothing to do with my career. It’s all been down to me so far, and that’s how I want to keep it. People are going to say, ‘She’s just the daughter of a famous pop star.’ Which is incredibly demeaning. They wrongly assume that I’m a full-time party girl who makes music in her spare time. Nothing could be further from the truth.
The one certainty in this life is that I will never, ever perform a duet with Sting.
There would be no reason on Earth for that to happen. He might be my dad, but we occupy entirely different musical universes. I’ve hardly talked to him about my music. When he listened to my album he simply gave me the thumbs up and that was the end of it.
I don’t take money from my parents – I fight to be financially independent.
Self-sufficiency is vitally important to my self-respect. I never wanted to rely on my parents in that way, because I knew that if I got used to it I’d be reliant all my life. Every day of my life someone will tell me that I’ve had it too easy. It’s an annoying misconception but I’ve learnt to live with it.
Nearly dying has been good for my creativity.
In 2009 I fractured my skull in a freak accident at an LA restaurant. I suffered a seizure and was rushed into hospital. I was so out of it that I refused to let them scan my brain. My dad rushed to my bedside and talked me into having the CAT scan – he told me that I might die if I didn’t go through with it. After four days in intensive care, I was put on heavy medication. The medication put me in the right state of mind to write songs.
'I don't take money from my parents - I fight to be financially independent,' said Coco (above with parents Sting and Trudie Styler)
My first ambition was to be a bank robber.
I wanted to be a proper gangster’s moll with a tommy gun under my arm, speeding away from banks with the police in hot pursuit. There’s still a part of me that would love to live that life. I’ll see how my album does – it’s always good to have something to fall back on.
I’d like to have Ian Dury’s face.
His face always told an interesting story. As a kid I loved to dress up as Ian Dury and run around hitting people with drumsticks. Members of my family, neighbours, friends, kids at school – no one was safe from my rhythm sticks. I didn’t see it as annoying – I figured that it was the sort of thing that Ian Dury would have done as a kid. I wore the braces, glasses, the whole Ian Dury look. I couldn’t imagine anything cooler in the entire world. As for me now, I try to avoid mirrors as much as I can.
I have absolutely no sense of smell.
That’s one of the side effects of my seizure. It sounds like a terrible thing, but I think it’s brilliant. Apart from the smell of bacon, petrol and my home-made shepherd’s pie, there’s nothing I miss. Obviously, having no smell has its potential drawbacks. If there was a fire in my house I wouldn’t get any early warning signs. Apart from that, I have no problems with it. My sense of smell may come back eventually, but I’m not that bothered. If it does come back I think I’ll find it too strange.
I started my career in the big top.
From the ages of 11 to 14 I worked in a circus and it was the best of times. Mostly I did stunts, falling off horses and goofy things like that. I’d have liked to have been the person who got in the cage with lions, but unfortunately there were no lions at this circus. It defeats the object, doesn’t it? One of the main reasons for going to a circus is to see whether anyone gets eaten by a lion.
I was a feral child.
As a kid my idea of fun was to make my own bow and arrow, then go out into the fields and kill chickens. It was fun to do, but I remember crying afterwards. Looking back, I was a fairly mischievous kid. I believe that children should do what they want so long as they don’t get caught.
My music is like an amazing pub that nobody else has heard about.
My life has been about music from the age of four, when my dad bought me my first guitar. Music is in my bones and my blood. It’s my oxygen. Growing up it was my little secret. Not because I was afraid it would be compared to my dad’s work. It was more a case that music was a world that I escaped into, and I feared that if I let anyone else in, they would ruin it. Now I’m finally ready to share my secret world.
I love playing my music under bridges and in hairdressers’.
The weirdest places to play music are the best. One time I organised an event under the bridge in Waterloo’s Cardboard City. I’ve done gigs in offices. I would perform every month at a hairdressing salon on Kentish Town Road, London. A buzz started up and that attracted the record companies, so I got signed.
Apart from music just about everything makes me nervous.
I find the most comfort in discomfort. I thrive on anxiety. On a creative level I need to feel edgy and insecure. That’s when I’m most at peace. To create anything I need to be in isolation and put myself in a slightly scary place, where all my senses are on edge.
Fame is just embarrassing.
I grew up with a famous dad, but I never thought of him as a celebrity. He was just my dad. We had a completely normal upbringing. It wasn’t as if Eric Clapton and David Bowie were popping round for tea every day. I grew up with no interest in fame and that’s how I’ve remained. I once did a Burberry campaign with Agyness Deyn, and afterwards if I walked past a shop with a huge poster of me in the window I’d die of embarrassment.
I was killed by Michelle Pfeiffer.
I was an extra in the film Stardust. She stabbed me in the chest, then cut my head off. It wasn’t a big role, but the least you can say about it is that it was memorable.
By the time I was nine I knew the chords to every Sex Pistols song.
I was a quick learner. It’s not much of an achievement when you consider that there are only three chords to learn, but it was important to me. I was always more of a punk than a hippy. I liked the idea of rebellion. Like most kids, I wanted to swear at teachers and generally be disruptive. I was shy and emotionally extreme. Punk gave me something to identify with.
Releasing my album feels like it’s my first year at school and it’s the first piece of homework I’m handing in.
I’ve spent my entire life building up to this moment and it’s an incredible release. It feels strange to have it finally out there, but it’s a good feeling. This is the beginning of what I hope will be a long and great adventure. It’s terrifying.
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