The story behind Adele’s first song in six years as LIZ JONES and ALISON BOSHOFF give their verdicts

She’s the singing superstar who took fright at global fame a decade ago and retreated into a reclusive life of luxury.

But now, with the release of Easy On Me, her first single from the album 30, Adele is allowing just a glimpse inside her very private A-list life. 

From her less-than-a-year-long marriage to her passion for exercise, astrology and Percy Pigs, ALISON BOSHOFF reports…

She gave up on her marriage within a year 

Adele and Simon Konecki started dating in 2011. Documents filed to court suggest that they were married on the eve of her 30th birthday, in May 2018. Her Titanic-themed 30th birthday party was actually a wedding celebration.

She’s said: ‘We got married when I was 30 . . . and then I left. I’m not gonna go into that detail. Remember I am embarrassed. This is very embarrassing. It wasn’t very long.’

They announced their separation in April 2019, less than a year on, but she said she made the announcement ‘much later’ than the split actually happened.

She told one interviewer that the intro to her break-up anthem, Easy On Me, came to her in the shower in 2018, meaning the relationship was all over within seven months at the most.

‘I was just going through the motions and I wasn’t happy,’ she said. ‘Neither of us did anything wrong. Neither of us hurt each other or anything like that. It was just: I want my son to see me really love, and be loved. It’s really important to me. I’ve been on my journey to find my true happiness ever since.’

In a Radio 1 interview, she admitted to starting fiery rows with Konecki, now 47, after the relationship broke down.

Guidance from gurus and astrology

She says her divorce was a result of planetary upheaval. When talking about the past six years, she cited her ‘Saturn return’, meaning that the planet had returned to the position it was in when she was born. She also showed a tattoo on her wrist of Saturn, with LA in the middle of it.

She explained: ‘I hit my Saturn return. It’s where I lost the plot. When that comes, it can rock your life. It shakes you up a bit: Who am I? What do I want to do? What makes me truly happy? All those things.’

She also confirms that she is close to wellness guru Jedidiah Jenkins, who took her swimming in a lake — fully clothed — and an ocean.

Jenkins, the writer of self-help book To Shake The Sleeping Self, recounts their meeting three years ago, at a mutual friend’s house in LA.

‘She sauntered over during brunch with half a bottle of Whispering Angel,’ he said. She told him: ‘Jed, I haven’t hung out with a group of strangers in 11 years. Will you take me to a party where I don’t know anyone?

‘I haven’t been in the ocean since I was ten. I’ve never been in a lake.’ They went on holiday to Idaho and spent a weekend in Santa Barbara.

Lots of therapy and looking after herself

Adele said she had a ‘Year of Anxiety’ in 2019 and had ‘a lot of sound baths . . . a lot of meditation . . . a lot of therapy, and a lot of time on my own’.

She added: ‘My therapist told me that I had to sit with my little seven-year-old self. Because she was left on her own. And I needed to go sit with her and really address how I felt when I was growing up. And issues with my dad. Which I’d been avoiding.

‘Not being sure if someone who is supposed to love you loves you, and doesn’t prioritise you in any capacity when you’re little, you assume it and get used to it.

‘So my relationship with men in general, my entire life, has always been: You’re going to hurt me, so I’ll hurt you first.

‘It’s just toxic and prevents me from actually finding any happiness.’

Jay-Z’s trainer has transformed her

Adele credits her extraordinary 100 lb weight loss not to dieting but to personal trainer Gregg Miele, whom she sees virtually every day at the Heart & Hustle gym in West Hollywood.

Miele is also a qualified holistic therapist and advises on nutrition. He spent five years travelling the world with Jay-Z, a friend of Adele via wife Beyonce, and working on his fitness. He calls himself a ‘creative mind’ with ‘hustler ambition’ and ‘gorilla spirit.’

Among the other celebrities he has trained are Jessica Alba and some NBA stars — an intriguing link because Adele’s boyfriend, Rich Paul, is an NBA sports agent.

She’s said: ‘I realised that when I was working out, I didn’t have any anxiety. It was never about losing weight. I thought, “If I can make my body physically strong . . . then maybe one day I can make my emotions and my mind physically strong.” ’

She added: ‘I got quite addicted to it. I work out two or three times a day.’

She does weights in the morning, hiking or boxing in the afternoon, and a cardio session in the evening with personal trainers. Her workouts have to take into account two slipped discs and the aftermath of a caesarean delivery. 

Son Angelo is on her new record

Son Angelo, eight, is centre stage on the album, which will come out next month. In one song she calls him ‘my little love’.

Angelo’s voice will be heard talking with his mother between verses in conversations that were recorded ‘at her therapist’s suggestion’.

The song ends with a tearful voicemail she left for a friend.

Why expose herself and her family this way? ‘I thought it might be a nice touch, seeing as everyone’s been at my door for the last ten years, as a fan, to be like, “Would you like to come in?” ’

Her friends take centre stage too

She invited some friends to sing a refrain, ‘Just hold on’, in one song. She explained: ‘The thing that they’re all singing is what my friends used to say to me. That’s why I wanted them to sing it, rather than an actual choir.’

This choir includes Jedidiah Jenkins. He said: ‘She quickly became a choir director, waving her hands and giving us the motivation of our words. And, of course, calling me out: “Jed, it’s not your album, blend in more.” ’ 

She’s still climbing her mountain

Adele had a tattoo of a mountain range added to her right wrist in 2019 after a ‘sobbing’ meltdown conversation with a friend in her late-40s who lives nearby in LA.

She said: ‘I told my friend, “I feel like I’m on a steep mountain, trying to get up to the top.” And she was like, “You will get there. And you’ll have a nice leisurely stroll down. And then there’ll be another f****** mountain.” And I’m like, “I’m not even over this one yet.” And she was like, “That’s just life.” ’ 

And who is her ex, Konecki?

The grandson of a Polish radio operator, Simon Konecki was raised in moneyed comfort by parents Andrew and Rosemary, who now live in Switzerland. 

He went to Eton College until he was 14 and was known as one of the naughtiest boys in his house.

He worked as a foreign exchange broker and at Lehman Brothers, before getting sick of the ‘corrupted’ world of finance and setting up a mineral water business and charity. 

He was married to stylist Clary Fisher and they had a daughter, Georgie, in 2006.

He met Adele in 2011 and son Angelo was born in 2012. In the early years, Adele talked about his ‘brilliance’ and said he was her ‘soulmate and best mate’.

However, by the time they finally married in 2018, it seems that the romance was in crisis.

But they still do ‘regular family movie nights’ — both of their houses have cinema rooms.

 Sorry, the agony of divorce deserves a better ballad

By Liz Jones for the Daily Mail  

Oh, the anticipation! Adele’s first single in six years is about divorce. Great, I thought. She knows what it’s like for those of us who have gone through hell.

If even a woman who is young, beautiful, rich, funny and talented can fail at marriage, then maybe those of us, like me, who also failed won’t feel quite so bad. 

We can take comfort in her soaring voice and shared pain.

At midnight on Thursday, women who have been cuckolded, disappointed, had the best years of our lives stolen from us (you can tell I’m still bitter) were going to be able to put on our headphones, or kneel by a speaker, and finally feel understood, heard, hugged.

But I’ve felt more solace, solidarity and sisterhood watching Married At First Sight Australia. Where’s the pain, where’s the insight? Goodness, even in the video there are no tears. 

She just leaves with a suitcase, when we all know real-life divorce, even her so-called amicable one, is far messier than that.

All we get are cryptic messages when what we want is someone to make sense of what we are feeling — or what we have felt.   

I was able to glean from the lyrics that she was too young to get married, and that she and her husband were set in their ways. 

She tried to change, for him and for their son, but she gave up. And, err, that’s it.

There are no embarrassing admissions to strike a chord with fellow divorcees. Me? I kept buying him things, endured the pain of veneers, had spray tans. Adele has attained a revenge body, but won’t admit it. 

She says she exercises three times a day to get away from her phone. If she were honest, it would be as uplifting as the corset into which Vogue squeezed her for its cover picture.

Because we women do that, don’t we, after a divorce? Put on make-up and a new dress when he comes to pick up the kids. In my case, I got a new face and even bigger success, just to rub his nose in it. 

Every relationship is different, but divorce is often messy and always difficult. Where’s Adele’s frustration, the hurt?

She says she wrote the song to explain to her son Angelo, eight, why his parents don’t live together, and asks him not to blame her when he’s older — hence the title, Easy On Me. But the problem here lies with her Me, Me, Me attitude. Even as a teenager, wanting to make it in the music industry, which is when I first met her, she was bolshy and self-entitled.

First, she cancelled our interview. When she re-scheduled, she didn’t apologise, just chain-smoked, said she was going to take a few months off to spend time with friends, and sod what her record company bosses might think.

She said in this month’s Vogue that she wasn’t ‘miserable miserable, but I would have been miserable had I not put myself first. But nothing bad happened or anything like that’.

That level of perfection isn’t what marriage is about. You have to bend over backwards sometimes. If I’ve learned nothing else from my failed marriage, it’s that you both must compromise.

Truthfully, I just don’t see the depths of my divorce — the shame, the shouting — in hers. I wanted the greatest female songwriter of the 21st century to make sense of the break-up of a marriage, to be on my side. 

I thought this song was going to be the relationship take-down to end all relationship take-downs. Give us the gory details! She is one of us, after all. Or at least she was.

We have to bear in mind she is now one of the most secretive stars on the planet, and I suppose she isn’t angry (or stupid) enough to bare her soul, or her ex-husband’s peccadilloes, on record. Problem is, this doesn’t produce great art.

Adele says that if a couple plays her new, long-awaited album, 30, in the car, they will cringe in recognition. The woman will say, ‘I’m done.’

Well, I’m done with this record, even though her voice and the music are beautiful.

Adele, like you, I’ve been through one of life’s most earth-shattering experiences. I need you. So where on earth are you? If you want to obfuscate, write about something trivial, such as whiskers on kittens and warm woollen mittens.

Divorce deserves a better ballad

It’s another belter

By Adrian Thrills for the Daily Mail  

Adele: Easy on me (Columbia)

Verdict: Classy and confessional 

Rating:

Easy On Me is now here — and it’s the kind of yearning, happy-sad ballad that has been Adele’s stock-in-trade ever since she wowed the nation at the Brits ten years ago.

Opening with mellow piano chords and a softly sung first verse, this comeback builds gracefully, with stunning vocal twists.

As Adele bares her soul over three minutes and 44 seconds, there’s tender restraint amid the power. What an exceptional singer she is.

Having described the period since her last album, 25, as a ‘maze of absolute mess and inner turmoil’, she wastes no time in confronting her woes in song. The upheaval of her 2019 divorce from ex-husband Simon Konecki, and its impact on young son Angelo, clearly weighs heavily.

‘I was still a child, didn’t get the chance to feel the world around me,’ she admits. The overall tone might be one of regret, but there’s also something uplifting here. It’s easy to envisage her millions of fans singing this song back to her in a packed stadium.

In 2019, she joked her next release was going to be ‘a drum and bass record, to spite you all’. I wouldn’t rule out a few surprises on her fourth album, 30, out on November 19 — but on big ballads like this, it’s clear she’s still pitch-perfect.

Thanks, Adele — it was worth the wait.

Adele breaks the internet! New single Easy On Me becomes Spotify’s most streamed song in a single day EVER – as tracks tops iTunes charts and racks up more than 34 million YouTube views within 20 hours – with fans left sobbing

Adele‘s new single Easy On Me has topped the charts in the UK and US and racked up a whopping 34 million views on YouTube after just 20 hours. 

Spotify also revealed on Friday the track has set a new record by becoming the most-streamed song in a single day ever, with a tweet captioned: ‘and just like that @adele set a new record.’ 

The singer, 33, left her fans in tears as she finally released her first new track in five years – which reflects on the pain she felt amid her divorce from husband Simon Konecki.

The highly-anticipated single, released on YouTube at midnight on Friday ahead of her album 30 set to drop next month, soon shot to YouTube’s top trending clip.  

Along with the music video – which sees the star, 33, pack up her house and drive away, as pages of sheet music flutter out of the windows onto the road – the single went down a storm with fans who took to Twitter to claim it was giving them ‘goosebumps’ and making them ‘sob’ – with one going as far to claim it made them want to get a divorce themselves. 

Adele revealed this week that Easy On Me, as well as 30, will be about the ‘inner turmoil’ she felt as she divorced ex-husband Simon.

The lyrics include the lines, ‘We’re both so deeply stuck in our ways, you can’t deny how hard I’ve tried. I changed who I was to put you both first,’ as well as, ‘Go easy on me. I was still a child, didn’t get the chance to feel the world around me, had no time to choose, what I chose to do, so go easy on me…’

She chants: ‘I had good intentions and high hopes but I know it now probably doesn’t even show.’

The video transfers from a black and white filter to colour halfway through, and starts with the singer on the phone, telling someone she’s on her way and that she might lose signal.   

The clip immediately drew parallels with the video for her 2015 hit, Hello, in which she moved into the house that features in Easy On Me.

However, eagle-eyed fans pointed out that the connection goes as far back to her 2018 song, Chasing Pavements and has a link to her 2011 single, Rolling In The Deep.

Taking to Twitter, one fan pointed out: ‘adele chased pavements in her hometown thank walk to someones house. than built a house in rolling in the deep, she moved in that house in hello and left the house in easy on me. a story teller!! #EasyOnMe [sic]’. 

Another penned: ‘Adele’s new song = goosebumps! Never in doubt of that queen!’

Another agreed: ‘Goosebumps listening to that new Adele drop. What a beautiful song man!’

A third chimed in: ‘Literally goosebumps all over, Adele is just incredible! Literally goosebumps all over my body!!’

Another joked, ‘Currently crying and throwing up at this new Adele!’ as someone else agreed: ‘Adele really got us single ass people crying over a breakup that never happened!’

Others penned, ‘One minute into the new Adele song and I started sobbing,’ and: ‘If the rest of Adele’s album is like “Easy on me”, I will most definitely be sobbing the entire time!’ 

Another impassioned fan wrote: ‘I love the fact that Adele chose a side profile for her cover art because it makes it all so much more beautifully vulnerable… this will be a devastating but tender and honest album, and I’m already sobbing with sadness and joy all at once!’ 

Fans were quick to joke that while the single may have been called Easy On Me, Adele hadn’t taken it with the easy with the vocals and lyrics, which left them blown away. 

Other listeners quipped that they were pretending to be divorced in order to relate to the break up inspired song while some discussed having very strong physical reactions to the track, joking they were ‘shaking, crying and throwing up’.

Another notable meme came in the form of fans joking that the video was a continuation of her video for 2015’s Hello – in which the singer also belted out a ballad while roaming around an empty house.  

However, not everyone was a fan, with several Twitter users complaining that they found the song boring. 

They penned: ‘Unpopular but I don’t like Adele’s new song. In fact sounds like every other song she brings out. A bit boring tbh.’; ‘Unpopular opinion: Adele’s new song sounds the same as her others. It’s boring. She’s too predictable. *ducks for cover*’

‘how are people stanning new adele… it’s so boring and predictable… no growth in how many years???’; 

‘Adele is an amazing singer but her content is extremely one dimensional and boring. We get it. He broke your heart. Haven’t you had any other life experiences?’; 

‘wasn’t expecting anything upbeat and fun from adele but that song is boring as hell and feels like a huge step down from hello’.

As for the professional critics, they all responded positively to the new single.

‘It’s not a heartbreak anthem as much as a tentatively hopeful ballad from a woman emerging from an emotionally marooned period,’ NPR’s Latesha Harris said of the song. 

While Forbes said the song could be summed up as ‘spectacular,’ Rolling Stone said that the singer’s comeback song has ‘reduced the world to tears’ . 

And the BBC described the song as ‘a big woolly blanket wrapped around the loneliness and pain of anyone who’s been through a core-shaking break-up.’  

Shortly after dropping the single, Adele appeared on various radio shows to plug her new album.  

The award-winning singer revealed she bares her soul on her new record, as it reflects the ‘inner turmoil’ she felt following the breakdown of her marriage, and forced to ‘unlock’ the door to her mental health.  

Appearing on BBC Radio 2 on Friday morning, Adele confessed she ‘lost sight’ of making music while going through her divorce, but it helped her to come to terms with how she was feeling.  

Speaking honestly about the recording process, Adele told host Zoe Ball: ‘It was bloody hard work to make. I was singing things I didn’t even realise I was feeling or thinking, but I’m really proud of it.’  

She continued: ‘I can’t unlock a key to the door with my mental health and take it with me, I’ve got to leave it in the door for everyone else… I’m in a strong place to put that vulnerability out… I’m really proud of it.’  

Having previously described her divorce as the ‘most turbulent period of her life’, Adele confessed: ‘I feel like I lost sight and lost the appreciation of what a gift it is to make music. 

‘I got a bit frightened of it for a while, but it really took care of me. I don’t know what my outlet would have been had I not had it… It was bloody hard work to make emotionally.’ 

As well as Radio 2, Adele zoomed in for the Hits Radio Breakfast show as she spoke with Fleur East about how son Angelo feels about having a famous mum 

The singer told Fleur that the album is about her son, she said: ‘The whole album is sort of dedicated to my son more than anything, but yeah it’s about my relationship with his dad and with him, but also you know the relationship I have with myself and stuff like that.

She continued: ‘It’s like you could be in you know, discussion or disagreement or a full-blown row if you want, not that me and his dad ever used to do that.

‘If you’re the one that’s sort of initiating the discussion, it’d sort of be like, “well hang on a minute, go easy on me, you know, it’s not my fault.” So it’s just sort of really about that in the way that, you know, the decision that I made really, so yeah.’

The singer also shared how Angelo – who turns nine this weekend – feels about her celebrity-status. She said: ‘He’s into like gamers, like he likes Flamingo and all them lot, like I mean yeah he ain’t bothered by me at all.

‘He does not care at all. He is like “you’re so busy all the time now, like blah-blah”. But no he doesn’t care and he’s always comparing. The other day he was telling me how many YouTube followers I have is nowhere near as many as the big gamers. I was like, “okay cheers kid, thanks for that.” Again no he’s not really aware of it yet.’

She continued: ‘He’s coming to a couple of, sort of work things that I have coming up and we’ll see, but I’m sure he’ll just be like, “well I think Flamingo will have done it like this or like that.” Like, yeah but he’s great, he’s a lot of fun, he’s a very lovely, lovely little boy.’

Elsewhere in the interview, Adele revealed her touring plans, saying ‘I’d love to do a big proper tour again. I wouldn’t do it quite as long as I did it last time, it was something like 130 odd shows in less than 18 months but, I would love to do that. 

‘But all the Covid rules are so different everywhere, and sort of like the rates of infection, the rates of vaccine whatever, it’s just, it makes me nervous trying to plan a world tour globally when it feels like no-one’s really on the same page. And the last thing I would ever want to do is cancel any shows again.’  

Taking to Instagram on Wednesday, Adele confirmed the new album’s release date will be November 19, adding a lengthy note in which she explained that she finally felt ready to release her music.

She wrote: ‘I was certainly nowhere to near where I’d hoped to be when I first started it nearly 3 years ago.

‘Quite the opposite actually. I rely on routine and consistency to feel safe, I always have. And yet there I was knowingly – willingly even, throwing myself into a maze of absolute mess and inner turmoil!

‘I’ve learned a lot of blistering home truths about myself along the way. I’ve shed many layers but also wrapped myself in new ones.

‘Discovered genuinely useful and wholesome materials to lead with, and I felt like I’ve finally found my feeling again. I’d go as far to say that I’ve never felt this peaceful in my life.’ 

Adele told how she sought support from the album writing process, which left her ‘sobbing relentlessly’.

She wrote: ‘And so, I’m ready to finally put this album out. It was my ride or die throughout the most turbulent period of my life. When I was writing it, it was my friend who came over with a bottle of wine and a takeaway to cheer me up.

‘My wise friend who always gives the best advice. Not to forget the one who’s wild and says “It’s your Saturn babes f**k it, you only live once”.

‘The friend who’d stay up all night and just hold my while I’d sob relentlessly not knowing why. The get up and go friend who would pick me up and take me out somewhere I said I didn’t want to go but just wanted to get me out the house for some vitamin D. 

‘That friend who snuck in and left a magazine with a face mask and some bath salts to make me feel loved while inadvertently reminding me not only what month it actually was but that I should probably exercise some self care.

‘And then that friend who no matter what, checked in on me even thought I’d stopped checking in with them because I’d become so consumed by my own grief.

‘I’ve painstakingly rebuilt my house and my heart since then and this album narrates it. Home is where the heart is x’.

Adele and charity CEO Simon, 47, announced they were going their separate ways in April 2019, with Adele filing court documents five months later. 

The couple – who dated for seven years and were married for two – co-parent their son Angelo, eight.

Their divorce was finalised in March this year, and Simon is believed to live in one of the three houses on Adele’s Beverly Hills compound so that he can be close to Angelo.

News of the album release date comes after Adele shared a first look at the single cover for Easy On Me on Tuesday.

The Someone Like You songstress looked stunning in the black and white teaser shot that was shared to her Instagram with the caption: ‘Easy On Me – October 15 – Midnight UK.’

Adele sent fans into meltdown when she played a clip of the song during her very first Instagram live stream on Saturday.

The star, who admitted she would get into trouble by her management, pressed play on the track in which she likened her emotions to a river. 

The vocal powerhouse also opened up about her mental health during the candid chat, revealing she takes it on a ‘day-by-day’ basis but feels it is ‘very good’ currently.

‘My mental health is very good at the moment. I take it day-by-day and I address whatever comes my way,’ she admitted.

‘It definitely helps me feel better if I take my time. Writing my music… yeah it’s been really therapeutic for sure.

‘I think I lost the appreciation for that. I got things out that I didn’t want to say out loud and talk about,’ the Hello hitmaker added.

‘What’s my next album going to be based on? Divorce, babe, divorce,’ the Tottenham-raised beauty quipped.

Adele also wasn’t shy of dipping her toes into the Free Britney movement, telling viewers that she had met the ‘lovely’ star a few times and is glad she’s happy.

Following her Instagram Live, Adele admitted she deeply regrets rejecting a collaboration with Peppa Pig, insisting she feels ‘terrible’ for her actions.

The Someone Like You hitmaker had  answered a firm ‘No!’ in response to a fan questioning if she’d do a collab with Peppa. 

The singer admitted feeling guilty after being confronted with a voice note by the cartoon swine during an interview on Capital Breakfast on Friday, with Adele remarking she ‘felt terrible the second I said it!’

Meanwhile, during the fun and candid chat, the star also told how she carries PG Tips teabags in her handbag as she struggles to get a decent cup in Los Angeles. 

Despite Adele having just dropped her single, Capital Breakfast hosts Roman Kemp, Sian Welby and Sonny Jay took the opportunity to focus on more pressing matters – her rejection of the lovable swine.  

T he radio hosts played a voice note from the Peppa Pig actor, which said: ‘Hello Adele *snort*, that made me really really sad when you said you wouldn’t collaborate with me! Why not! Don’t you like me?’

And after clarifying that it was indeed the real Peppa Pig actor, Adele responded: ‘Firstly of all babes, Peppa that aint’ the one of you I know. That’s not the same voice that I grew up with with my son. 

‘Oh my gosh, but Peppa I spent three years watching you [laughs]. I deeply regret it, anytime you want to go jumping in muddy puddles and singing in muddy puddles, I’m with you babes. I felt terrible the second I said it!’

Roman responded: ‘Out of all the things, did I take it too far with Peppa Pig’, with Adele adding: ‘I know, I did, I had no idea what I was doing!’

Meanwhile, the superstar admitted that the presenters were making her ‘homesick’ before revealing she’s heading back to the UK very soon.      

She explained; ‘I’m coming back soon actually, I’m coming really really soon. I just had to wait for my NIE or something to get back here…’

Roman said in response: ‘Oh that’s too much complication at the moment’, with Adele remarking: ‘Yeah I got locked out from home, but I was there a lot last year and it was lovely.’

When asked if she’ll get a ‘decent’ cup of tea upon her return, Adele said: ‘Oh 100%’ before admitting to going to extreme lengths to ensure she has a taste of home, revealing she struggles to get a decent cup in LA as the ‘dairy is different’.

She said: ‘You can’t no, because the dairy is different. You know the cows. I’ve got PG tips all the time, I carry them in my handbag! 

Adele’s former singing teacher also offered an insight into the star growing up as she appeared on Friday’s episode of Lorraine. 

 Liz Penney – who taught Adele at the prestigious BRIT school – said: ‘I am extremely proud, it’s quite difficult maintaining that level of proud for so long. 

‘I very much remember meeting Adele and recognising something special. I haven’t seen her for quite a long time, but if I did I’m sure she’d be the same Adele at 13 when I met her.’

Revealing that Adele came back to visit the BRIT school after 21 was released, Liz added: ‘She came to see a show and she came backstage and was saying to everyone just stick with it if this is what you want to do, continue and work hard. 

‘That’s one of the things she was very good at, she was very self-motivated. She sat in the corridors writing songs, quite happily and quite willingly. She was very generous when she came back, she didn’t have to, she could have been a bit more celebrity about it.

Meanwhile, the ’30’ title for Adele’s album falls in line with her preferred way of naming her records, with all three of her studio albums named after her age.

Her debut album 19 was released in 2008, followed by 21 in 2011 and 25 in 2015.

As Adele has followed the previous pattern, the 30 album has plenty of inspiration, having been the age she separated from ex-husband Simon.

The Brit Award winner recently broke her silence on her divorce, recalling the heartbreaking moment their son Angelo asked, ‘Don’t you love my dad anymore?’

Speaking to American Vogue in her first interview in five years, Adele revealed she hopes her new album, in which she sings about her divorce, will help Angelo understand what happened when he’s older.

She explained: ‘He has so many simple questions for me that I can’t answer, because I don’t know the answer. Like, “Why can’t we still live together?”

”That’s just not what people do when they get divorced.”

”But why not?”

‘I’m like, “I don’t f***ing know.” That’s not what society does.’

‘And, “Why don’t you love my dad anymore?” and I’d be like, “I do love your dad. I’m just not in love.” I can’t make that make sense to a nine-year-old.’ 

Adele also admitted she struggled with talking to their son about her separation, causing her so much anxiety that her therapist suggested she record herself speaking to Angelo so she could remember what had been said.

She told British Vogue: ‘Obviously Simon and I never fought over him or anything like that. Angelo’s just like, “I don’t get it.”

‘I don’t really get it either. There are rules that are made up in society of what happens and doesn’t happen in marriage and after marriage, but I’m a very complex person.’

She added: ‘When I was 30, my entire life fell apart and I had no warning of it.’

Yet insisting there was no bad blood between the pair, she added: ‘It just wasn’t… It just wasn’t right for me any more. I didn’t want to end up like a lot of other people I knew. I wasn’t miserable miserable, but I would have been miserable had I not put myself first. But, yeah, nothing bad happened or anything like that.’

Despite their separation, Adele has no regrets, saying she chose the ‘perfect person’ to have a child with.

Elsewhere, she confirmed that she and her new boyfriend, sports agent Rich Paul, 39, are ‘very happy’ and has revealed that he’s ‘frazzled’ by her huge, global fame.

She also told American Vogue in a separate profile published Thursday, that Rich ‘just incredibly arrived’ days before her estranged father passed away from cancer aged 57 in May this year, after the pair fell out in 2011.

The cockney star introduced Rich – who represents LeBron James – to the interviewer, who noted how the singer beamed with, ‘Hi, darlin’!’ when he walked into the photoshoot.

‘Yes, we’re together,’ Adele confirmed in the interview, adding: ‘We’re very happy.’

The man at the centre of Adele’s heartbreak anthem: Friends insisted split would ‘not turn nasty’, but what will old-Etonian charity boss Simon ‘Swampy’ Konecki – known for being fiercely private – make of singer airing their dirty laundry? 

Adele has wowed her fans around the world today as she finally released her first new track in five years – Easy On Me – which reflects on the pain she felt amid her divorce from husband Simon Konecki.

But who is the mysterious old-Etonian and charity CEO who swept the singer off her feet and supported her through superstardom – before she began airing their dirty laundry in public? 

Simon, 47, who was born in New York but moved to London as a child, attending Eton before going on to work in the city as a teenager, with stints at the Lehman Brothers and EBS.

Having been nicknamed ‘Swampy’ by workmates, he left banking behind in 2005 and  set up the ‘ethical’ Life Water company, selling bottled English mineral water.

He began dating Adele in 2012, after being introduced by mutual friend Ed Sheeran, with rumours circulating that their relationship began before the end of his first marriage to stylist Clary Fisher. The two welcomed a child, Angelo, in October that year.

Adele and Simon married in 2018, but the relationship quickly soured and they separated in 2019- at the time, friends insisted the split wouldn’t turn nasty. 

But earlier this year, it emerged Adele was reportedly forced to use mediators to split up her £140 million fortune during her divorce from husband Simon.

While not quite in the same league, former Etonian Simon has his own money and is reportedly worth around £2m ($2.7m) in his own right. It has been reported they did not even sign a pre-nuptial agreement before they wed.  

And now, with Adele revealing all about their relationship in her latest album, 30, notoriously private Simon is yet to release any comment. 

What of Simon? The grandson of a Polish radio operator, He is the son of Andrew and Rosemary Konecki — who live in Vevey, Switzerland, where income tax is a maximum 11.5 per cent. They also have a £1 million holiday home in Boca Raton, Florida. 

He was born in New York, where he lived for the first 10 years of his life, before his family moved to London. 

There, he attended the prestigious boys school Eton (fees, £30,000 a year) alongside contemporaries like Camilla’s son Tom Parker-Bowles and Bear Grylls.

He left when he was around 14. Simon was placed in the boarding house of history teacher David Evans, who was at Cambridge with some of the Monty Python team.

The house had a reputation for being badly behaved and it seems that Simon fitted right in. 

At 17 he had started his first job, as a trainee foreign exchange broker. He later recalled how he wore a pin-striped suit with red braces to the interview (‘inspired by the film Wall Street’).

He added: ‘They took me to the pub and proceeded to take the mickey out of me for hours. But I got the job.’ 

When he worked in the City, his nickname was Swampy thanks to his ‘long hair and Leftie views’. (Swampy was an environmental activist briefly famous during the Nineties.)

Seven years later, he started running teams of senior brokers at Lehman Brothers. 

Stints investment holding company EBS followed. By 2004, Simon had fallen in love with and married Clary Fisher, a striking fashion stylist from Swindon, Wiltshire.

She had studied costume at the Bristol Old Vic and tailoring at the London College Of Fashion. She then worked as a stylist for TV and fashion shows and music bands.

The young couple first set up home just off The Highway in East London, before moving to Flask Walk, one of Hampstead’s most coveted addresses.

Extrovert Simon made friends with EastEnders actor Sid Owen and playboy heir Lucas White. It was a fast crowd — the late Tara Palmer-Tomkinson was also on the fringes of the scene.

In 2005, disillusioned with banking, Simon left the City behind.

In an interview, he said: ‘I was doing well and earning a lot of money, but I got sick of that greedy and corrupted world.’

After giving up his job, Clary gave birth to their first child, a daughter, Georgie, in 2006 and they left London for Brighton.

There, Simon set up the ‘ethical’ Life Water company, selling bottled English mineral water.

What set his business apart was its partnership with a charity Drop4drop, which would provide clean drinking water in the developing world — at a rate of 1,000 litres of clean water for every one litre of mineral water sold.

Simon sought celebrity endorsements, making friends with Stephen Fry among others. But as he devoted more and more time to business, his marriage foundered.

A former neighbour, speaking on condition of anonymity, recalled the Koneckis’ marriage had fallen apart amid much bitterness.

She said: ‘Even when they first moved into the house in Brighton, Clary wasn’t happy. She told me they had only moved because Simon wanted to be near his family and he had failed as an investment banker in London.

‘She frequently spoke negatively about Simon’s parents as they would bail him out a lot. 

‘She often complained they had no money and that everything extra they had went into his water business.

‘In the summer, when we had the doors open, you could hear them rowing in the kitchen.’

By 2009, according to the neighbour, Clary was on her own in the house with their daughter. 

In 2011, he met Adele, after being introduced by British singer Ed Sheeran.

Party-loving Simon is 15 years her senior and was said to be impressed by fame. 

Adele, blunt to a fault, was initially dazzled by Simon’s ‘brilliance’ and education. 

Soon after Adele and Konecki were first spotted together, it was reported that he had started his relationship with Adele before his divorce from Fisher had been finalized.

However, Adele denied these reports in a blog post on her official website, stating that they were in a relationship, but that Konecki had been divorced for 4 years. 

They had son Angelo in 2012, uprooting from London to LA, and Adele waxed lyrical about her husband.

When she won Best Original Song Motion Picture in the Golden Globes in 2013 for Skyfall, she said she would no longer be using heartbreak as source for new material.

According to her in Parade magazine, ‘My inspiration normally comes from heartbreak, but I don’t think I am going to have to get devastated again, so that’s good.’ 

In 2014, there were rumours of trouble when it was claimed that Konecki had moved out of their London home and into his bachelor pad in Brighton.

Adele eventually responded to the reports on Twitter, writing: ‘Just wanted to wish everyone happy holidays & all the best for 2015! PS Simon & I are still very much together, don’t believe what you read x.’

However, the pair were photographed in June that year having an argument outside London celebrity hotspot Chiltern Firehouse.

Meanwhile Simon was an inspiration for the album 25, which was released in November 2015. 

When she accepted the Grammy Award for Album of the Year, she concluded her speech by saying, ‘Grammy’s, I appreciate it. The Academy, I love you. My manager, my husband and my son — you’re the only reason I do it.’ 

Meanwhile in an interview with the Rolling Stones in the same month, Adele revealed that her song, ‘Water Under the Bridge’, is about Konecki and their relationship. 

She said, ‘It was sort of about a relationship suddenly getting really, really serious, and then getting a bit frightened by it, and then realising that ‘I think this must be right. This is the relationship that I want to be in for as long as I can possibly be in it.’

Over the years, Adele gushed about her love for Konecki who she has credited with helping her recover from vocal cord surgery in 2011.

She said: ‘He’s wonderful and he’s proud of me but he doesn’t care about what I do or what other people think. He looks after me. I don’t think I would have gotten through the recovery for my surgery if it hadn’t been for him.’

She told Matt Lauer on his NBC Today show in 2015, that she had ‘never been happier’.

‘And I’ve never been healthier. So I’m good,’ she added, while promoting the chart-topping follow-up to her previous smash hit album 21.

Adele went on: ‘Being in such an amazing relationship with someone that’s so there for me and so loyal and is really part of my core now, that’s what made me write about everything I’ve ever done, because I’ve got his love.’ 

They married in a secret ceremony in 2018. 

By the time they finally married, having been together for five years, sources say that the romance was already in crisis.

‘It was one of those marriages which went wrong from the start,’ a source said.

‘They had been trying for years, but eventually you have to accept that something just isn’t going to work out,’ said another insider.

By the time of Adele’s Titanic-themed 30th birthday party in May 2018, the marriage was heading for its own iceberg.

Actor Aaron Paul, producer Mark Ronson and film director Sam Taylor-Johnson joined others including actress Emma Stone to toast her health.

Rumours of trouble also flew when Simon showed up to the Brit Awards in February 2019 without Adele. Their final public appearance was in January that year, at a concert by her good friend Sir Elton John. 

What was the trouble? It seems Simon was ‘the wrong guy’ for Adele, who is famous in showbusiness for her take-no-prisoners attitude.

One record company source sighed that the album 25 was ‘put back more often than Cher’s hairline’ because of Adele — and anything less than perfect isn’t good enough for her.

And finally that included the husband who she once said was her ‘soulmate and best mate’.

In April 2019, Adele announced she and Konecki had separated after more than 7 years together. 

Their lives, undoubtedly, diverged. Living in her huge £7 million LA mansion, Adele found it was easier to hang out with young music stars without him — he didn’t come with her to see Taylor Swift or Drake in concert recently. Both stars are also her personal friends.

The great negative, of course, will come with a settlement to Simon. There was no pre-nuptial agreement, and Adele is worth more than £140 million.  

In 2018, she signed over a house in LA’s Van Nuys district to Simon. The suburban house is worth £488,000. She has two other glorious homes in LA, the mansion and a beach house worth £5 million. He’s been given the third-best property.

They also shared adjoining mews houses in West London, although apparently Adele is now spending a few weeks with her mother in South London. 

Meanwhile it was revealed in May 2019, that Adele had splashed out on a £8.53million Beverly Hills home just feet away from her Simon’s pad in order that they can co-parent their son. 

Simon also had commitments in the UK, where he has a teenage daughter by his first marriage, who lives in Brighton. 

He also travels to the South Sudan, Malawi and Mozambique where his clean water charity is at its most active.

In January, sources told The Sun that despite Adele and Simon’s breakup originally staying amicable, they had to use mediators to agree certain terms to their settlement. 

Despite Adele’s mammoth fortune, earning £73k ($82k)-A-DAY in royalties alone, insiders claim there was never going to be a nasty fall-out with them over finances. 

It’s been reported that the pair, who were married for three years and together for eight, were keen to avoid a nasty ‘Hollywood style’ divorce which would ‘drag on for years.’

The pair will share custody of their son Angelo, but ‘financial, sales or other confidential business information’ regarding the proceedings will not be publicly available.’

Sources previously insisted the separation was ‘unlikely’ to turn nasty. An insider told the Mail On Sunday: ‘Simon’s not like that. He’s got his own money after investing in his self built Broker association.

His only concern now is that he and Adele remain the best parents they can be to Angelo.’

He has remained silent in recent weeks as Adele began ramping up the PR efforts ahead of her new album release, and is yet to pass comment on her latest single. 

Adele revealed this week that Easy On Me, as well as 30, will be about the ‘inner turmoil’ she felt as she divorced ex-husband Simon.

The lyrics include the lines, ‘We’re both so deeply stuck in our ways, you can’t deny how hard I’ve tried. I changed who I was to put you both first,’ as well as, ‘Go easy on me. I was still a child, didn’t get the chance to feel the world around me, had no time to choose, what I chose to do, so go easy on me…’

Shortly after dropping the single, Adele appeared on various radio shows to plug her new album.  

The award-winning singer revealed she bares her soul on her new record, as it reflects the ‘inner turmoil’ she felt following the breakdown of her marriage, and forced to ‘unlock’ the door to her mental health.  

Appearing on BBC Radio 2 on Friday morning, Adele confessed she ‘lost sight’ of making music while going through her divorce, but it helped her to come to terms with how she was feeling.  

Speaking honestly about the recording process, Adele told host Zoe Ball: ‘It was bloody hard work to make. I was singing things I didn’t even realise I was feeling or thinking, but I’m really proud of it.’  

A £140m net worth, £34.7m property portfolio and £60k-a-day in royalties: What was up for grabs in Adele’s megabucks divorce from Simon Konecki 

While details are unknown of the ins and outs of the divorce, we take a look at the star’s finances show the vast wealth she has amassed during her time in the spotlight – and wisely invested in property. 

From her lavish Kensington mews – an amalgamation of two homes – to her sprawling Beverly Hills pad, where she lives with their son Angelo, eight, Adele has managed to garner a £34.7m ($47.4m) property portfolio.

The pair will share custody of their son Angelo, but ‘financial, sales or other confidential business information’ regarding the proceedings will not be publicly available.  

But how has Adele spent and invested her eye-popping £140million fortune?

PROPERTY 

Since shooting to fame, Adele has shown a keen interest in the property market and has bought and sold a number of lavish properties both in the UK and US. 

CURRENT HOMES 

2012-2013:  KENSINGTON MEWS 

£5.65million ($7m) and £5.38million ($6.6m)

Back in 2012 she bought a mews house in Kensington, for £5.65million ($7m) before purchasing the house next door for £5.38million ($6.6m) with plans to knock the two through in order to give her extra space.

The house includes a display cabinet in which her Oscar for the song Skyfall is housed, along with the sparkly Burberry dress and Louboutin silver platform pumps which she wore for her performance

2012: A HOME FOR MUM

£600,000 ($738k)

The Skyfall singer transferred ownership of her flat in trendy Notting Hill to her mother, Penny Adkins, according to publicly-available land registry records. 

2018: FIRST BEVERLY HILLS HOME 

£8.5 million ($9.5 million) 

 The London native, paid $9.5 million for a home in the luxe neighborhood. The neighborhood counts among its residents stars like Jennifer Lawrence, Katy Perry and Cameron Diaz, Ashton Kutcher, Mila Kunis, Penelope Cruz, Javier Bardem and Nicole Kidman.

2019: SECOND BEVERLY HILLS HOME

£8.53million ($10.65million) 

Adele splashed out on this five-bedroom, six-bathroom home, which was built in the early 60s, spans 6,045 square feet and sits on nearly an acre . The includes a large office, an art studio, a crafts room, a library and a gym.

At the time, incredible images confirmed that her home is just feet away from her estranged husband Simon’s pad – with the lavish houses literally sitting opposite one another.

ROYALTIES 

Thanks to her catalogue of wildly popular music, Adele could never work a day of her life again and still be raking in handsome profits from royalties alone. 

It was revealed in May 2019, that the Someone Like You hitmaker, had splashed out $10.65million (£8.53million) for a Beverly Hills home that sits just opposite another residence she owns where Simon, 45, resides.

In 2019, Adele raked in nearly £23,000 a day despite not releasing a record or going on a tour. She made a staggering £8.6million profit last year after taxes, which works out to £23,719 a day.

According to The Sun, the she has two companies which look after her royalties and album sales. The first is Melted Stone Ltd which makes a net profit of £483,546 while Melted Stone Publishing Ltd makes £8,173,994.

The publication also reported that her balance sheets lodged at Companies House comes to nearly £41million – making her one of the richest women in entertainment. Adele’s fortune is continuing to sky-rocket, with Adele making nearly £18million from her business without stepping foot into the recording studio in the last two years.

The talented songstress – whose last album was called, 25, in 2015 – has her fortunes estimated at £65million in 2016. At the time, she was the second highest paid woman in music. 

It was also reported back in February that Adele raked in a whopping £142million profit from her 15-month world tour, which kicked off in 2016. Records revealed that the singer’s company, Remedy Touring LLP, made the hefty sum from both ticket and merchandise sales – but that Adele paid herself £42million.

According to The Sun, the hitmaker’s company made close to £70million profit during the Adele Live – with the remaining funds covering the tour’s costs.

The sums mean Adele made more than $1million per show, having performed 121 dates between February 2016 and June 2017 in Europe, North America and Oceania.

OFFERS ON THE TABLE 

Adele has been offered a slew of other big money deals in the past – but has allegedly turned them all down in favour of spending time with her family.

The star was reportedly offered £1million to sing for Arab Billionaires in the Middle East, as well as a £20million residency in Las Vegas.

A source said in 2017 that the Adele was contemplating a 12-month stint at The Wynn Hotel, with a paycheck of £382,000 ($500,000) per show, however these plans were put on hold.