Robbie Williams has written an open letter to Take That’s ex-manager Nigel Martin-Smith objecting to claims Martin-Smith made about his drug addiction in a new documentary.
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Both appeared in the first episode of three-part BBC documentary Boybands Forever, which aired yesterday (November 16) and focused on the struggles members of Take That, Westlife and Five dealt with at the height of their popularity.
Martin-Smith managed Take That in the 1990s while Williams was still part of the band, before he quit in 1995 and went on to build a successful solo career.
He said that when Williams became addicted to drugs, he was “smart and quite clever” to blame his drug taking on being “in this band where he couldn’t have girlfriends or couldn’t go out”. At one point, he said Williams acted like a “wanker” and that he was made out to be “evil”
Williams has now hit back at Martin-Smith’s claims in an extended post on Instagram.
“Hope all is good in your world and life is being kind to you,” he began. “Just thought I’d jot down a few thoughts about our appearance together as talking heads on the boyband doc.
“I was equal parts terrified and excited to be sharing a screen with you again. Excited to see where we both are on this journey and terrified in case old emotions would be triggered and I’d still be in a place of anger, hurt of fear.
“As it happens, it would appear that time has done its thing and I guess the wisdom it brings has taken its mop to a few nooks and crannies here and there. I guess not every nook has been bleached, though.”
On the subjects of Martin-Smith’s comments about his drug taking, Williams wrote: “Allow me to respond to your assertion. My drug taking was never your fault. My response to the warped world that surrounded me is solely my own. How I chose to self-medicate is and was something that I will be monitoring and dealing with for the whole of my life. It’s part of my makeup and I would have the same malady had I been a taxi driver.
“I just got there quicker due to having the finances while trying in vain to counteract the turbulence of pop stardom’s matrix-bending washing machine.”
He continued: “If you are following the story closely, you can’t help but notice a pattern emerge. Boys join a boyband. The band becomes huge. Boys get sick. Some are fortunate through a series of self-examinations and help to overcome their experience. Some never quite manage to untangle the mess of the wreckage of the past.
“I’m not breaking anyone’s anonymity by sharing the side effects of boyband dysphoria that relate to just us lads,” he continued, before detailing the struggles his bandmates had. Howard Donald became suicidal when Take That first split up, Mark Owen deal with addiction, Gary Barlow had bulimia and for Jason Orange, “whatever effect Take That had on him is so painful he can’t even be part of it.”
“I will also remind you that the person acting like a ‘wanker’ was 16 when he joined the band and 21 when he left. That was the last time I saw you,” Williams wrote.
“I hope I have more grace and understanding when and if any of my own four children at such a vulnerable age behave in the same manner.”
He said of Martin-Smith: “Nige, you continue to not come across as a relatable character and could do with a glow-up where redeemable features are concerned. Therefore you play into the narrative you don’t want for yourself.”
Later on, he concludes: “Nigel, I do love you, but sadly, it’s also true that I don’t like you,” he wrote. “The two I am coming to find aren’t mutually exclusive.”
English boy band Take That, circa 1992. Left to right: Robbie Williams, Mark Owen, Gary Barlow, Jason Orange and Howard Donald. (Photo by Tim Roney/Getty Images)
Williams’ words follows similar comments he made about the late Liam Payne, remarking that there needs to be a push for something to be “done in his name to make things better”.
“It’s very difficult [and a] grey area to put things into place, to look after people properly. I know there are talks about what to do and how to facilitate this, but [that] comes with already having money in place.”
“That negates the young manager and the young band that are doing everything out the back of a Transit van – who don’t have the money in place to facilitate it. So there’s all of these grey areas,” he added.
Williams continued (via Goss.ie): “It needs addressing and there needs to be a think tank by creative people, like myself and others to get together and figure out what’s the best way to tackle this problem for our entertainment industry.
“Everybody on the planet right now is neurodiverse, has been through trauma, is struggling to come to terms with their childhood or struggling to come to terms with their place in the world and yeah, it’s very difficult,” he said. “It’s weird times, but it’s really interesting times to be alive too.”
Shortly after Payne’s death, a petition was launched calling for a new law to safeguard the mental well-being of artists in the music industry. Within hours it had reached over 40,000 signatures, and, at the time of writing, has over 137,000 people backing it.
Songwriter Guy Chambers, for instance, called on the music industry to stop putting minors in boybands, while Williams said the issues faced by pain had some common ground with his history of self-harm and depression as a former boyband member.
Similarly, Sharon Osbourne accused the music industry of “letting down” Payne, while Bruce Springsteen added that the music industry puts “enormous pressures on young people”.
In other news, Williams has spoken about touring at the same time as the Oasis comeback tour.
“When Oasis get back together, there is no competing, really,” he continued. “Unless I’d taken a 20-year break, then it would be a fair fight. Oasis coming back together, I don’t think anyone could compete with that – including Taylor Swift, who’s the biggest artist on this planet. So no, it’s not a competition, even though it bloody is.”
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