AUDIE CORNISH, HOST:
John Grant is not your run-of-the-mill rock star. First off, he belongs to a special club of musicians who are superstars overseas but relatively unknown here in their home country. Grant was born in Michigan. There's more. He lives in Iceland, speaks four languages. He's openly gay and HIV positive. He's also a recovering addict. As Mark Daley reports, it all comes to play in Grant's music.
MARK DALEY, BYLINE: John Grant's journey from obscurity in Buchanan, Mich. to playing sold-out gigs at London's Royal Albert Hall started in the 1990s with his band The Czars.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "GET USED TO IT")
THE CZARS: (Singing) I wanted that. I needed that. I anticipated this for the longest time. I want to be desired by that. I want it to infatuate me. I want to see if I can overcome without saying that.
DALEY: The Czars released eight albums over 12 years. And this was a big deal for Grant, who'd come from a home where his parents were convinced that he needed to be, quote, "fixed" because of his sexual orientation.
JOHN GRANT: When I was young, people were so disgusted by me, just disgusted, you know, I mean, the hatred. You know, before I even knew that I was gay, everybody else had it figured out and, you know, they were letting you know.
DALEY: Grant submerged self-hatred, dysfunctional relationships and anxiety in an oblivion of alcohol and drugs, even as The Czars gained critical acclaim.
GRANT: You know, I spent a lot of time caring and it drove me to really just try and annihilate my brain. And I just felt like I was going to fall apart if I didn't learn to be myself.
DALEY: The Czars split. Grant stopped drinking, and he stopped making music for a couple of years of recovery. Slowly, he says, he began to find the courage to bring his whole self out in his first two solo records. He sang about being HIV positive and railed against a bad boyfriend.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "VIETNAM")
GRANT: (Singing) It isn't complicated. You just don't care. You attack me by not saying anything. You say that you don't bring your anger to me, but it poisons every fiber of your being.
DALEY: Ultimately, Grant realized he was dealing with severe depression.
GRANT: You got to get past the point where, you know, you can't believe that you're feeling this depression. You can't believe that you can't get out of bed again. I don't know. You know, sometimes I still can't believe how much it can beat me down.
DALEY: He tried to work through it in songs that can be painfully self-aware says BBC 6 Music presenter Mary Anne Hobbs.
MARY ANNE HOBBS: I think when you assess most songwriting, even if it's based upon a true story, it's embellished in some way, you know, the narratives are fabricated. But John's lyrics, they're so true they might as well be written in blood.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "JESUS HATES F*******")
GRANT: (Singing) Can't believe that I've considered taking my own life 'cause I believed the lies about me were the truth. It will be magic to watch your transformation when you realize that you've been had. It's enough to make a guy like me feel sad. 'Cause you tell me that Jesus, he hates fruit loops, son. We told you that when you were young.
DALEY: John Grant says that those close to him have questioned whether exposing so much of himself is a good thing to do.
GRANT: It can be painful sometimes. Sometimes you might be feeling like you're drudging things up, but that isn't usually what's happening. Usually you've sort of dealt with it and went through it when you wrote the song. And then when you perform it, there's just the joy of connecting with people.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "GLACIER")
GRANT: (Singing) This pain, it is a glacier moving through you.
DALEY: Pioneering singer and broadcaster Tom Robinson can hear a more confident Grant in his most recent record. Robinson had a worldwide hit with "2468 Motorway" in the late 1970s, and was one of the first rockers to come out as gay and to mix music with LGBTQ liberation.
TOM ROBINSON: It's so great to hear somebody making music this unashamed and yet this irresistible. If I had heard a song like "Snug Slacks" when I was a gay teenager in the '60s, I think it could have saved me 10 or 15 years of heartache and pain.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "SNUG SLACKS")
GRANT: (Singing) Do you think that life is easier when one looks as good as you do? Or do people always say that you're a narcissist?
DALEY: John Grant wants listeners to hear the fun in his music because that's part of him, too.
GRANT: I want it to be a mixture. I want it to be a mixture of pain and laughter, you know, which is a good representation of what life is like.
DALEY: For NPR News, I'm Mark Daley.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "GREY TICKLES, BLACK PRESSURE")
GRANT: (Singing) I did not think I was the one being addressed in hemorrhoid commercials on the TV...