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UK jazz star Emma-Jean Thackray: ‘I had the word weirdo thrust upon me. So I’m reclaiming it’

Autistic and with ADHD, the chart-topping musician always felt out of step – and then she had to face terrible grief. She explains how her new album helped her survive

Similarly, in the video for new song Wanna Die, Thackray plays every member of her band, introduced – in a send-up of the infamous Fast Show sketch Jazz Club – by a turtlenecked Gilles Peterson, her label boss. We head upstairs to her home studio, a compact room with a back wall of records, percussion instruments from around the world, and a figurine of the 90s cartoon character Daria on her desk, with whom she shares round spectacles and dry wit. The rebirth is well under way: Thackray has just supported saxophone megastar Kamasi Washington around the UK and Europe, has a new show on Jazz FM and will embark on an in-store tour to launch Weirdo in May.“It’s been easy to write, and now it’s going to be difficult to do live,” she says, adding that she trusts her audience to be understanding, and that she hopes that “people are gonna find their own grief or struggles reflected” in the album.

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