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Former X Factor winner Matt Cardle says drug addiction nearly killed him

The singer is clean after battling drugs and alcohol. (PA)
The singer is clean after battling drugs and alcohol. (PA)

Former X Factor favourite Matt Cardle has spoken about his battle with drug addiction that almost ended his life, after describing his ‘fall from grace’.

Matt, 34, won the reality music show back in 2010 but within a few short years his life began downward-spiraling, when Sony dropped him from its label in 2012.

It began after the star innocuously injured his finger and became hooked on the painkiller Tramadol – otherwise known as ‘Hillbilly Crack’.

‘I wasn’t that injured, I didn’t really need it. I started eating Tramadol for fun if I’m honest,’ he told the Sun.

Asked whether there were any times he came close to death, the singer shockingly revealed there were plenty: ‘There were a number of them,’ he claims. ‘I didn’t realise because a lot of it was on my own. I would wake up in various parts of my flat, in the toilet, in my bedroom, on the bed, off the bed, in the lounge, and it would always be like, “Oh that’s where it ended”.’

Mel C and Matt Cardle perform at the Specsavers Spectacle Wearer of the Year Awards held at the Royal Opera House in London. (Ian West/PA Wire)
Mel C and Matt Cardle perform at the Specsavers Spectacle Wearer of the Year Awards held at the Royal Opera House in London. (Ian West/PA Wire)

Matt spoke about the dangers of taking the powerful drug and how it’s very easy to never wake up after overdosing on it: ‘If you were on your own and you’re completely smashed and you’ve taken one or two too many, you won’t wake up, it’ll stop your heart and that’s it. So it was getting to that point for me without knowing it.’

The When We Collide singer also admitted how he began taking potentially dangerous concoctions of valium and alcohol. ‘…the first time I did Valium was on a flight to LA and that was it.’

‘Valium and alcohol are lethal together anyway. It’s a muscle relaxant and your heart’s a muscle,’ he says about the mixtures he was experimenting with.

However, things got worse when the performer got into a physical altercation with his drug dealer in 2013, at the Jingle Bell Ball in Belfast. ‘I was completely addicted,’ he said, which was the point that even his dealer tried to step in and help him. ‘”You’re never having any more of them off me”,’ Cardle recalled the dealer saying; who then contacted the star’s brother over his alleged concern.

He remembers the physical state he was in when trying to score drugs off said dealer, who flat-out refused to give him any more. ‘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”.’

X Factor winner Matt Cardle performs at the O2 Shepherds Bush Empire, London, in 2014. (PA)
X Factor winner Matt Cardle performs at the O2 Shepherds Bush Empire, London, in 2014. (PA)

Currently, Cardle is working hard on his music career and announced a new album four years ago. At the tail-end of 2017 Cardle revealed that Sony had actually resigned him. He’s now clean and preparing to release a fourth studio album, Time To Be Alive, which is out on 27 April.

The X Factor winner was a huge success on the show after getting over 44% of the final’s public vote. He went on to comfortably get the Christmas Number 1 spot and stayed at the top of the charts for three weeks with the Biffy Clyro cover.

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