Stormzy has addressed his split with Maya Jama on his new album and said he wanted to publicly apologise for the “disrespect” he showed her.
In the track Lessons on Heavy Is The Head, the grime star sings about his regrets over the end of his relationship with the TV star.
The lyrics say: “Fast forward now, my nephew’s still asking for his Auntie Maya,
“Guess this is the karma for what I done to Maya,
“I just stood and let it burn, I couldn’t done the fire, Lord, I pray you make it easy, that’s my one desire.”
He adds: “I can’t even look you in the eye, that’s ’cause of shame,
“Now you’re tryna block me out your mind, that’s ’cause of pain
“Greatest love I ever knew, I poured it down the drain
“Maybe it’s the only way we both call it a day
“You gave me the world and then I gave you disrespect
“Hand on my heart, this is my biggest of regrets.”
MY SECOND ALBUM – ‘HEAVY IS THE HEAD’ – OUT NOW #HITH 👑 https://t.co/87Fx80CwCC
— HEAVY IS THE HEAD (@stormzy) December 13, 2019
Speaking to Dotty on BBC Radio 1 Xtra, he said: “For me, it was just being honest in my truth; the strange thing about it is it’s not my truth alone.
“It’s me throwing Maya out there as well, that is something we shared and it’s on a public forum.
“Everything happened so public, it was a hot topic, and I’m going on record now and I’m apologising, I’m trying to lay it all bare and be very truthful and be very clear in my truth as well.
“I’m not trying to shy away from it, it was a public disrespect, you can’t really privately address that.
“It was a public disrespect that needed a public apology.”
He continued: “That is a phenomenal woman who loved man wholeheartedly, gave man everything and was man’s everything and you acted, you disrespected and was inconsiderate.
“I didn’t want it to be cryptic or poetic, I guess it is poetic, but I will say that 100% loud and clear, that is a brilliant woman and we shared something very deep and she loved me wholeheartedly and I disrespected.
“Does the world deserve that? No, but she deserves to know that. I tried to communicate that to her through my art.”
Stormzy’s second album, a follow-up to the acclaimed Gang Signs And Prayer, comes months after he became the first grime star to headline Glastonbury.
It features collaborations with Aitch, Burna Boy, Ed Sheeran, Headie One, H.E.R., Tiana Major9 and Yebba and J Hus, while the track Superheroes samples the Tracy Beaker soundtrack and references children’s author Malorie Blackman.
His publishing imprint #Merky Books, a collaboration with Penguin Random House, will publish Blackman’s forthcoming autobiography and Stormzy will star in a BBC TV adaptation of her Noughts And Crosses series, which is set in an alternative 21st century Britain where black people rule over white people.