GIANT: Did you grow up with music?

No. I fell into it by accident.

How so?

I was 13, in drama class, first year. The teacher asked everybody to get up and sing, which I was uncomfortable doing. I was painfully shy as a child. I came up to her and said, “Please don’t make me sing. I can’t sing. I’ve never sang before in my life.” But then I got up, and I think the song was “Miracle,” that Whitney Houston song. Everybody was really quiet. And nobody really clapped. They had clapped for everybody else. I thought that I had been so brutal that they couldn’t even clap for me. Later in the day, everyone started coming up to me saying, “You can really sing.  You should do something about it.” After that, I got gospel voice lessons. I got piano lessons. Started writing.

What was your first musical obsession?

Stevie Wonder. At first everybody laughed at me because I was like, “Hey, there’s this guy. His name is Stevie Wonder.” People were like, “Uh, yeah.” I was fourteen. I’d never heard of him.

How did you discover new music when you were younger?

I’d listen to things on the radio and go, “Who’s that? Oh, that’s James Brown.” I wanted to get his album and just hear it. I started saving my pocket money and went down to the store and said, “I want this. I want that.” My house wasn’t very musical, so I sort of found it myself, which, in a way, is exciting. It wasn’t like my mom and dad listened to Lionel Richie. I got to choose my own soundtrack.

Do you still live in Ireland?

Yeah.

What have you learned growing up in Ireland that you wouldn’t have learned anywhere else?

It’s such a cliché that people say, “Just be yourself all the time.” But I feel that the older I get, the more I try to do that. When I signed [my record deal], I was 17, and I’m 21 now. It’s a long time before your record comes out. But I just feel that if my record had come out any time before, I’d be an absolute train wreck, like Amy Winehouse or Britney Spears.

I saw a photo of you with Al Green. What’s up with that?

I met him at Malahide Castle in Ireland. I went on, and he came backstage and started shouting out, “If I was twenty years younger…” I just kept looking around, like, “He’s not talking to me.” My friends were like, “Oh, he’s talking to you.” I just kept smiling. He went into his dressing room and was just like, “Come on over!” He invited me into his dressing room and was like, “Would you like some champagne, baby?” I was like, “Yeeeah!” I just sat there, and he asked me how I was, and we talked, and then we walked to the stage together. He said, “Would you like to walk me to the stage?” So I just walked to the stage on his arm. And then he thanked me for supporting him onstage. I just could not stop smiling the whole night.

[Laura Izibor performs her single, "Shine"]

What can we expect from your album, Let The Truth Be Told?

It’s authentic. I don’t just want to say authentic soul because I think that word is just thrown around so much these days. Everyone sings with soul in their voice. But it does have the true, genuine, old-school soulfulness to it. The songs I’ve written are from me.

What are you being honest about?

I’ve done a lot of collaborations, and none of the collaborations made the album. When you collaborate, you talk about structure and concept: “Imagine if we did this. Imagine this situation.” But I can’t connect with that.

Does your honesty ever embarrass you?

No. Not this album. But the way I’ve been writing recently, yeah.

How so?

As you get older, you’re more comfortable with your emotions. I’m getting very expressive, very real, very present. I used to have to wait for something to happen and then be comfortable with it, and then I can write. Now I’m in the pits of it and I’m pissed off when I write.

Is there any aspect of your life that you won’t touch in a song?

The good thing about lyrics is you don’t have to be completely obvious. You can go very personal, but with metaphors. I wouldn’t be so self-explanatory that people are coming up to me and putting an arm around me going, “Oh, you poor thing.”