I can only imagine how excited the producers of X Factor were when Samantha Jade came across their desk back in 2012. She’s a reality TV producer’s dream:
✔️ Supremely talented
✔️ Camera-friendly (read: gorgeous)
✔️ Heartwarming backstory with requisite ‘highs and lows’ storyline
✔️ So sweet it’d be easy to think you could push her around
What I suspect they didn’t see coming was just how much grit and perseverance was packed into the little girl with the big voice. If you look at her body of work, one thing stands out: she is nothing if not a fighter. And boy, has she had to fight for her art.
Plucked from Perth obscurity and signed with a big US music label at the tender age of 16, Sammi battled hard to ‘make it’ over on the biggest of stages before returning to Aus and entering - then winning - X Factor. Since then, you’ll often see and hear her throughout Aussie media, sitting on the couch of the Today show or our biggest radio stations when she has a single or important cause to promote, and singing her heart out every year on things like Carols in the Domain. But she’s probably not the global superstar her fans (myself included) believe she could and should be, and I wanted to know if that pi$$es her off.
I think you sometimes give attention to the people who don’t [follow], too much attention to them, and it shouldn’t be about those people - it should be about the people who are in your corner. Like, why am I always caring about people who don’t care and trying to win over the people who don’t necessarily like you - that’s fine, they don’t need to, not everyone needs to - focus on the people who do.
In this deep and at times emotional chat, we go deep on who’s in Samantha’s corner both personally and professionally and what it’s like living without her biggest champion - her beautiful Mum Jacquie.
Here’s the cheat sheet:
[02:00] How are you, really? Samantha answers the question she says we don’t ask genuinely enough.
[04:20] Samantha talks Love.Sick Vol.2, her latest musical offering all about l.o.v.e.
[05:45] ‘I didn’t get paid for a show until I was 26'!’ Samantha peels the curtain back on the shiny, glossy music industry.
[10:25] What I wanted to ask was ‘does the fact you’re not yet on Taylor-or-at-least-Kylie-level make you a tiny bit furious?’… but I was heaps/a bit more tactful
[16:45] ‘I think we’ve stepped into a new era.’ Celebrating women in midlife and the incredible bodies of work we create.
[19:10] Samantha talks about losing her biggest champion, her beautiful Mum Jacquie. ‘You don’t meet people like that very often. She would find what your special superpower was and then she would completely build you up.’
[21:20] ‘I realised no one else was meant for that box.’ Who do you turn to when you lose your most important person?
[29:55] ‘She went in with a cold and never came out.’ Sammi takes us back to her Mum’s diagnosis. ‘That’s the day my life changed.’
[38:45] ‘Sadness is not the worst feeling, helplessness is.’ The wild world of prognoses and loving someone who is dying.
[41.40] The silver lining of a terminal diagnosis: time to say goodbye. How Sammi’s Mum ‘came back’ to make sure her kids knew how much she loved them.
[44.00] ‘You learn to let things roll off.’ How the context of Sammi’s worst experience gives context to the other hard days.
I often joke about Sammi that god was in a really good mood on the day he (she/they) made her. Watch our chat on YouTube here:
Lastly, a reminder that Australia’s Griefline - free and confidential counselling and support to people experiencing grief and loss across Australia, inclusive of remote, regional, rural and metropolitan regions - is there for you on 1300 845 745 or here 24/7.
Connect with us:
⚡️ Follow Samantha on IG here: www.instagram.com/samanthajade/
⚡️ Listen to Love.Sick Vol.2 here:
⚡️ Follow Casey on Instagram: www.instagram.com/caseyberos/
⚡️ Find out more about Casey’s work: www.caseyberos.com
⚡️ Want more of Casey’s words? There are limited copies of The ‘Bad’ Girl’s Guide To Better out in the wild as well as Amazon and Audible, or hit this link for a signed copy sent straight to your door
⚡️ Missed an episode? Catch up here!
🎧 EP 1: CHANGE YOUR LIFE ONE HABIT AT A TIME with DR GINA CLEO
🎧 EP 2: WHAT YOU DON’T KNOW ABOUT TRAUMA with NIKKI HEYDER
🎧 EP 3: HEALTH ADVICE TO SAVE YOUR LIFE with DR MICHELA SORENSEN
🎧 EP 4: THE POWER OF PERSPECTIVE with MICHAEL CROSSLAND
🎧 EP 5: LIFE AFTER LOSS with AMY MOLLOY
🎧 EP 6: BUILDING A LIFE BEYOND BOOZE with SARAH RUSBATCH
🎧 EP 7: BIOHACK YOUR WAY TO BETTER HEALTH with NICK ENGERER
🎧 EP 8: THE SECRET LIFE OF MONEY with MOLLY BENJAMIN
🎧 EP 9: FEELING LOST? THIS IS FOR YOU with DR TIM SHARP
WHO'S IN YOUR CORNER? with SAMANTHA JADE