[Shaun]

Sam Smith has opened up about his sexuality, revealing that his album was inspired when he fell in love with a man.

The singer had ignited rumours last week, when the music video for his track ‘Leave Your Lover’ showed him at the centre of a gay love triangle.

Fans had previously noted Smith’s tendency to only sing gender-neutrally about lovers.

He told The Fader today: “In the Lonely Hour is about a guy that I fell in love with last year, and he didn’t love me back.

“I think I’m over it now, but I was in a very dark place. I kept feeling lonely in the fact that I hadn’t felt love before.

“I told him about it recently, and obviously it was never going to go the way I wanted it to go, because he doesn’t love me. But it was good as a form of closure, to get it off my chest and tell him.

“I am comfortable with myself, and my life is amazing in that respect.

“I’m very comfortable and happy with everything. I just wanted to talk about him and have it out there.

“It’s about a guy and that’s what I wanted people to know – I want to be clear that that’s what it’s about.

“I want to make it a normality because this is a non-issue. People wouldn’t ask a straight person these questions.

“I’ve tried to be clever with this album, because it’s also important to me that my music reaches everybody. I’ve made my music so that it could be about anything and everybody – whether it’s a guy, a female or a goat—and everybody can relate to that.

“I’m not in this industry to talk about my personal life unless it’s in a musical form.”

in case it wasn't obvious