Entertainer, showman, hit machine. At the age of only 32, Robbie Williams has already been a household name for 15 years, transforming from boy-band pin-up to the nation’s favourite entertainer.
For five years in Take That and the last ten years as a solo performer, he has produced a constant stream hit singles (24 top ten hits, six number ones in the U.K.). Robbie’s solo songs soundtrack the soap opera of his life and the times in which he has lived it, chronicling his rise to superstardom and his struggles as a man.
Back in 1995 Robbie’s pop career was looking done and dusted by the time he was barely 21. That summer he walked out on Take That, the boy band with whom he enjoyed eight straight number-one hits and became a teen idol. A result of refusing to be controlled as a pop puppet any more, his departure prompted the group’s split a year later.
Boys who break up successful bands seldom prosper on their own. And true to form, solo success proved hard to find at first. Robbie’s first singles and debut album brought only modest success by the chart-topping standards to which he was accustomed. Then, as Christmas 1997 approached his epic soaring ballad ‘Angels’ became the anthem for a generation. Before long his first solo album ‘Life Thru A Lens’ hit number one – six months after its release.
The summer of ’98 saw Robbie conquer Britain. He suddenly started winning a new generation of grown-up admirers. He was voted the year’s best male singer not only by his old Smash Hits fans, but also the discerning readers of NME and Melody Maker. The defining moment of the year – indeed of Robbie’s entire career – was Glastonbury’s mass singalong to ‘Angels’ by the biggest crowd ever gathered in front of the Pyramid Stage. Followed by similar scenes at Slane, V98 and T-in-the-Park.