LAST time I interviewed Daniel Bedingfield, it veered from the surreal to the ridiculous. But then Mr Bedingfield is not known for being a straight-talker.
Two years on, I encounter a rather different 25-year-old, though still in eccentric territory at least this time he's not pretending to be someone else.
But then again a near-death experience can change a chap and last year Daniel had just that.
Following a Christmas vacation with his family in New Zealand in January last year, Daniel's 4x4 came off the road. His passenger escaped unhurt but Daniel had to be cut from the wreckage and suffered serious injuries.
After talking about the matter for the last 12 months, Daniel is a little weary of the subject but obliges anyway.
"Please don't ask me too much about the accident," he pleads, before launching into a breathtakingly fast precis of the last 18 months. Went out on the road, came off the road, broke 10 bones in my neck, it influenced my music because it made it a lot more passionate because I had some time off because it shook me up and after the last album I had been feeling very drained.
"It made my life a lot more interesting. I take the time to appreciate the small things like the sky, the wind and the grass a lot more. Physically I have to have physio every week but I'm alright I'll survive."
With Daniel it is always hard to know when he is being serious so we'll take all that at face value and move on.
Since his breakthrough track Gotta Get Thru This, which he famously recorded in his own bedroom, shot to number one in 2002, Daniel has been regarded as one of the UK's most talented singer-songwriters.
His debut album of the same name sold 1.7m copies and the follow-ups If You're Not The One and Never Gonna Leave Your Side also topped the charts. His latest album Second First Impression, released in October, did not fare quite so well, charting at number eight, though the first single Nothing Hurts Like Love peaked at number three.
