Josh Groban on becoming famous so young: 'I should have had a shrink then'
PASADENA, Calif. – Josh Groban has been performing professionally for more than 20 years, and he's learned a thing or two in that time.
The multi-hyphenate singer spoke to the Television Critics Association Saturday to promote his March PBS concert special, "Josh Groban Bridges: In Concert from Madison Square Garden," and reflected on getting a record deal and becoming famous as a teenager, which he says was hard on his mental health.
"In my universe we kind of wrote our own playbook," he said of his career. "I was a late bloomer. I was a young 18-year-old. I didn’t feel emotionally, maturity-wise, fully prepped for the accolades, the criticism."
Although he had to be mature and polished on the outside, "inside I had a super thin skin," he said. "That was tough, because I didn't really feel fully embraced by my own industry, even though I was selling a bunch of albums early on. ... Everyone else was kind of dismissive. I didn’t feel part of the community. I didn’t feel part of the party. I wasn’t going to the Grammys, I wasn’t on the cover of Rolling Stone. I wasn’t being written about kindly – or at all."
Groban says that while he was "really happy" with his success, he struggled feeling alone in the industry. "I should have had a shrink then; I have a shrink now."
Inevitably, he's glad he made his own way through his career. "Then you have the freedom to do whatever you want."
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Josh Groban on becoming famous so young: 'I should have had a shrink then'
