Entertainment Music Music News•August 17, 2026 at 3:21 PMNational

‘You’ve got to see this girl!’ Tanita Tikaram on making Twist in My Sobriety

By Interviews by Dave Simpson•The Guardian Music

‘People tell me it helped them with their rehab. I have to explain: Sorry, it’s not about alcohol – I was just a kid singing about injustice’I wrote the lyrics on the floor of my bedroom in Basingstoke when I was 16 or 17, as a way of decompressing from studying for my A-levels. I had the idea for “Twist in my …” something, but didn’t know what else to put in there. I tried “Twist in my gravity” before ending up with “sobriety”, but it’s not a song about alcohol. It’s about feeling that things aren’t right in the world, and that adults can do terrible or immoral things – but none of it will change you. Fundamentally, it’s a song by an alienated teenager who feels there’s a lot of injustice. There’s something lovely about how intensely you feel things as a teenager. Continue reading...

‘People tell me it helped them with their rehab. I have to explain: Sorry, it’s not about alcohol – I was just a kid singing about injustice’

I wrote the lyrics on the floor of my bedroom in Basingstoke when I was 16 or 17, as a way of decompressing from studying for my A-levels. I had the idea for “Twist in my …” something, but didn’t know what else to put in there. I tried “Twist in my gravity” before ending up with “sobriety”, but it’s not a song about alcohol. It’s about feeling that things aren’t right in the world, and that adults can do terrible or immoral things – but none of it will change you. Fundamentally, it’s a song by an alienated teenager who feels there’s a lot of injustice. There’s something lovely about how intensely you feel things as a teenager.

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