{"id":772637,"date":"2026-09-16T15:34:09","date_gmt":"2026-09-16T15:34:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/772637\/"},"modified":"2026-09-16T15:34:09","modified_gmt":"2026-09-16T15:34:09","slug":"i-thought-i-would-lose-my-career-orville-peck-on-addiction-and-creating-his-best-album-yet-music","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/772637\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018I thought I would lose my career\u2019: Orville Peck on addiction and creating his best album yet | Music"},"content":{"rendered":"

Orville Peck was in the middle of a soundcheck when he found out that his idol Dolly Parton<\/a> had died. It was late August and the masked, pseudonymous country singer was due to perform an intimate set at London\u2019s Rough Trade East in half an hour. The news hit him like a truck. With no chance to process it, he decided to grieve in real time, on stage, before a roomful of fans.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m a little bit of a mess right now,\u201d Peck told the audience, perched on a stool with an acoustic guitar. \u201cDolly was my hero,\u201d he continued, his voice cracking. \u201cAs a gay man coming into country music and feeling sort of alone, I think the thing that always felt comforting is, like, just knowing Dolly existed in country. It made me feel like I had a friend there.\u201d He then launched into a rendition of Parton\u2019s iconic hit I Will Always Love You.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt felt like an impromptu memorial,\u201d Peck recalls on the sofa of his New York City hotel room three days later, having touched down the night before to promote his new album, Mule. \u201cI had to work through it with 400 strangers. We all got to sort of mourn together. I definitely think everyone there will remember that forever.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mortality has been on Peck\u2019s mind a lot lately. Mule is a brutally honest chronological account of what he describes as \u201cthe most important year of my life\u201d, a period marred by profound heartache and self-destruction during which he split up with his partner of four years, overdosed and nearly died. Its opening track envisions his own memorial \u2013 what would have happened if he hadn\u2019t come back from the brink. Prologue (Eulogy of a Man Turned Mule)<\/a> is an a cappella hymn sung not by Peck, but by Emmylou Harris<\/a>, Allison Russell and Noah Cyrus, a trio of country muses from different generations whom he compares to the witches of Macbeth or a Greek chorus. \u201cCome walk through the fire, come stand with the few \/ Who break their own hearts to be saved,\u201d they intone. \u201cBut the heart can\u2019t be saved from the wretched and blue \/ Here lies a man turned mule.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

While country has been dominating<\/a> the top spots of the Billboard Hot 100 this summer, Peck emerged from Toronto during 2019\u2019s \u201cyee-haw moment\u201d, as artists like Kacey Musgraves<\/a> and Lil Nas X<\/a> were turning some pop listeners\u2019 ears to the genre, injecting it with disco and hip-hop beats and a modern, queer sensibility. His face obscured, Peck kept his true identity a mystery, but he was open about his sexuality, and undeniably sexy, out of the gate (he recently posed for Playgirl<\/a>). That he had a baritone croon that evoked Roy Orbison and Elvis Presley made his arrival all the sweeter. Over the next few years, Peck would duet with Elton John<\/a>, Kylie Minogue <\/a>and another one of his major inspirations, Willie Nelson<\/a>, who dueted with him on a cover<\/a> of the gay country classic Cowboys Are Frequently Secretly Fond of Each Other, score a No 1 album on the UK country charts and scoop up Glaad\u2019s Vito Russo award for elevating LGBTQ acceptance and visibility. In 2025, he made his Broadway theater debut as the Emcee in the vibrant revival of Cabaret at the Kit Kat Club.<\/p>\n

The 38-year-old musician\u2019s previous records \u2013 2019\u2019s Pony, 2022\u2019s Bronco and 2024\u2019s Stampede<\/a> \u2013 were laced with metaphor, at times unspooling like the dusty tales of an omniscient, enigmatic gunslinger. While the bluegrass-inflected Mule is more literal, like an unvarnished memoir, he couldn\u2019t abandon the high drama completely. \u201cI still wanted to add some kind of theatrical element,\u201d says Peck. Today, he wears a white tank, chunky Wrangler x Cherry knit jacket, faded jeans, cowboy boots and a cream-colored Stetson. His penetrating blue eyes peek through a simple suede mask, but his trademark disguise, a black leather upper with a fringed veil, sits behind him on the bed, its golden tassels cascading over the edge of it. His right hand and wrist are wrapped in a thick bandage.<\/p>\n

\u201cI thought, We\u2019ll start with the most bleak thing possible,\u201d Peck continues. \u201cIf I had died in 2023, if that was my legacy, what would these three witches be singing about?\u201d<\/p>\n

Peck is not afraid to contemplate his own demise, nor is he afraid to be sitting now in the same hotel where he tried to take his own life. \u201cIt\u2019s like when people ask me, \u2018Oh, do you regret any of your tattoos?\u2019\u201d he says, chuckling at the slight absurdity of the analogy. \u201cAnd I\u2019m like, Well, I have some that are really shitty, but I would never get rid of them or wish I hadn\u2019t gotten them, because I feel like it\u2019s part of my story.\u201d<\/p>\n

He would not deny, however, that his overdose may be the darkest chapter of that story. The night it happened, in June 2023, he was preparing to kick off his tour for Bronco with a sold-out concert at the Theater at Madison Square Garden. He went out to celebrate, got hammered, bumped into his ex at a club and spiraled. His management found him the next morning and gave him an ultimatum: he would cancel the tour and get help, or they\u2019d cut ties with him. After rallying to play the packed show that evening, he announced that he was postponing his remaining tour dates to focus on his mental and physical health. Then he flew back home to Los Angeles and checked into a rehabilitation center.<\/p>\n

Orville Peck. Photograph: Aidan Klimenko<\/p>\n

While he could acknowledge that he was leaning too much on booze, cocaine and prescription pills, he entered the facility begrudgingly. \u201cI was like, I\u2019ll be fine. I\u2019ll play along with the parts that I don\u2019t really think I need, and I\u2019ll just kind of roll my eyes at the stuff I\u2019m entitled to be annoyed about,\u201d Peck says. \u201cI believed that I had it under control.\u201d<\/p>\n

He details his dismissive outlook and resentment \u2013 which he now realizes was just blinding denial \u2013 in the first half of Mule. He refers to rehab as \u201cthe slammer\u201d and deems it a waste of time in the mocking Already Gone<\/a>. In the next track, the clever, ragtime-y Rehab Blues, the reality of his surroundings sets in: watchful eyes, sad sharing circles, stifling seclusion. \u201cSo catch me on the evenin\u2019 news: Dumb fag dies from the rehab blues,\u201d he sings sardonically, later confessing, \u201cI hate it here, I don\u2019t care and I wanna die.\u201d<\/p>\n

Peck left the center about a month later, knowing full well that he\u2019d continue to use. He told himself that he wasn\u2019t like the others he\u2019d met there. He wasn\u2019t an addict. \u201cThere\u2019s a term for it: We call it terminal uniqueness,\u201d Peck says. \u201cWhere a part of you is actually seeing that it\u2019s totally you, but then a massive part of you is going, But I\u2019m different. I can stop.\u201d<\/p>\n

The root of his resistance, he thinks, was an inveterate aversion to following the herd. Growing up queer and closeted in South Africa and Canada, he had supportive parents \u2013 his father was a glam-rock sound engineer and his mother is an artist and a seamstress \u2013 but he says he felt alienated from his peers. \u201cThat\u2019s where this otherness came from\u201d, he says. \u201cAt first, it was put on me \u2026 and it was unbearable.\u201d To escape, he turned to ballet and musical theater. He discovered punk and the renegade country of Nelson and Johnny Cash<\/a>. He found himself drawn to outsize characters like Parton and John Waters<\/a>. His reaction, eventually, was to wear his outsiderness as a badge of honor. That is where Orville Peck, the masked lone ranger, was born.<\/p>\n

Orville Peck performing at music festival Oya in Oslo, 2019. Photograph: Gonzales Photo\/Alamy<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s hard for someone like me because it takes not just admitting to yourself that you have a problem \u2013 I also had to reckon with my phobia of conforming,\u201d he says of his struggle to get sober. \u201cIn a situation like that, I choose to remove myself in a way that\u2019s like, I don\u2019t need this shit. I\u2019m not the same.\u201d He\u2019d been carving out his own path for most of his life to protect himself. With his successful stage persona, he explains, a defense mechanism to shield his vulnerability had become his superpower. But by 2023, it had become his downfall.<\/p>\n

After rehab, the partying and blackouts continued. He was still reeling from his breakup at the beginning of that year. Solo and shattered in his house in the Hollywood Hills, he tried filling the void with tricks and flings, including, as he reveals in the song Ring the Bell, an affair with a linebacker for the Las Vegas Raiders. (He remains coy when pressed for specifics, telling me only: \u201cI snogged him and it was hot.\u201d)<\/p>\n

His recklessness escalated until he woke up one morning that November, after a particularly brutal night, terrified. \u201cI was like, You are gonna lose any chance of getting your relationship back. You\u2019re gonna lose your career. You could lose your life,\u201d Peck recalls. \u201cIt scared the absolute shit out of me.\u201d<\/p>\n

He knew things had to change. \u201cFinally, I was able to drop all of the traumas and the hang-ups and the defenses and the patterns, and all the things that we all walk around with all muddled up, and look at myself in the mirror and say, \u2018Get your shit together.\u2019\u201d He pauses. \u201cI have not taken a drink since.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sobriety brought clarity, and a desire to dig deeper. He came to understand that his battle with addiction stemmed, at least partly, from the pressures that accompanied newfound stardom, particularly the tug-of-war between Peck the performer and the man behind closed doors. Mule\u2019s penultimate song, War of the Worlds, tackles this duality. \u201cThe dilemma I have on this album is not me versus this character that I\u2019ve created, or whatever people think,\u201d Peck says. \u201cThe dilemma is, I am an incredibly sensitive, hurt person who\u2019s carrying around a lot of shit that I have to work on \u2013 and then my job requires me to also navigate thousands of people\u2019s opinions of every single breath I take. That creates a dichotomous life, regardless of if Orville Peck is my birth name.\u201d<\/p>\n

Peck\u2019s attempt to reconcile his two identities \u2013 the famous Orville he\u2019d become and the pre-fame dreamer of his youth \u2013 gives the album its title, and the name of its closing track. Mules are half horse, half donkey, and they cannot reproduce, he explains. Perhaps they, like him, feel trapped somewhere in between, unsure where they belong, always a little alone. He is quick to clarify that he\u2019s not looking for pity. He just knows he has to figure most of this out on his own.<\/p>\n

Orville Peck\u2019s album art for Mule. Photograph: Warner Records<\/p>\n

When he was drinking and on drugs, Peck says, he had \u201cpretty much no ability\u201d to reckon with his past or cope with the bumps in the road. His relationships, friendships and wellbeing suffered because of it. \u201cI had this insane fear of abandonment,\u201d he says. He couldn\u2019t fathom being unlovable or unwanted, so he\u2019d stay in terrible, even abusive situations. He doesn\u2019t do that anymore. \u201cI was just so, so hurt,\u201d he says. \u201cI still hurt sometimes,\u201d he adds, \u201cbut now I think I have the courage to face it.\u201d<\/p>\n

As he approaches three years of sobriety, Peck seems to be riding high. Despite its grim subject matter, Mule is often funny, knowing and buoyant. It\u2019s his best album yet (or at least his catchiest). While he never got to meet or collaborate with Parton, a bucket-list item for him, he did achieve another one of his big career goals, making his Grand Ole Opry debut in July \u2013 the first song he performed that evening was, coincidentally, I Will Always Love You. He has become a hero in his own right, showing queer kids that Nashville\u2019s once-conservative country scene may actually have a place for them. And he\u2019s found love again.<\/p>\n

As our interview wraps, I ask Peck why his hand is bandaged. He laughs, clearly embarrassed, and tells me that he punched his new partner\u2019s mostly finished birthday cake as a joke and fractured his finger on the table beneath it. I look incredulous, but he laughs again and waves it away. \u201cIt\u2019s a long story,\u201d he says. His smile suggests it is ultimately a happy one.<\/p>\n

In the UK and Ireland, Samaritans<\/a> can be contacted on freephone 116 123. In the US, you can call or text the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline<\/a> at 988 or chat at 988lifeline.org<\/a>. In Australia, the crisis support service Lifeline<\/a> is 13 11 14. Other international helplines can be found at befrienders.org<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Orville Peck was in the middle of a soundcheck when he found out that his idol Dolly Parton…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":772638,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[6491,96,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-772637","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-celebrities","tag-celebrities","tag-entertainment","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/772637","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=772637"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/772637\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/772638"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=772637"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=772637"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=772637"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}