Former ‘X Factor’ winner Matt Cardle has revealed how he almost died after regularly binging on a cocktail of alcohol and drugs.
The 34-year-old says his life spiralled out of control when he found himself without a recording contract or a manager just three years after winning the ITV singing competition.
Matt beat One Direction, who ended up in third place, in the 2010 series, but he says seeing his friends find global fame and fortune while he struggled to have a hit led to his downfall.
He told The Sun: “I got lucky on a number of occasions not to have been found fucking cold.
“I was being rejected left, right and centre for a record, for all of this kind of stuff. And none of it was bitterness, but it’s just frustration about my fall from grace.”
After injuring his finger whilst on tour, Matt demanded a prescription for Tramadol, a super strength painkiller – which Ant McPartlin has called ‘hillbilly crack’ – and Matt says he began “eating it for fun”.
He tells The Sun that it was his dealer who finally made him see the light after Matt started a fight with him when he refused to sell him any more drugs.
“I came and met him and he just saw the state I was in because I didn’t have any and then he went, ‘No I’m not going to give them to you’. And I actually snatched them out of his hand and shoved him and it got a bit horrible,” he explained.
Matt has since completed a spell at The Priory rehab facility and got himself clean.
He says: “I was never suicidal but I honestly didn’t care about myself. You don’t wind up in The Priory if you’re looking after yourself. I really didn’t.”
The singer is now back with his old label, Sony, and will release his fourth album ‘Time To Be Alive’ in April.