Becky Hill has never been one to shy away from the truth, and in a candid new interview the Brit award-winning singer has laid bare the struggles that ran alongside her rise to fame, from being scammed as a child to coming to terms with sexual assault and battling impostor syndrome throughout her career.
The Worcestershire-born artist, who grew up in Bewdley after being born in Bromsgrove in 1994, has reflected on a turbulent personal journey that sat in sharp contrast to her growing success in the music industry. ‘Aside from the music I was making, I hated every minute of my 20s,’ she said.
Hill first caught the public’s attention when she reached the semifinals of the first ever series of The Voice UK, and she has been building her career ever since. She has racked up two top 10 albums, collaborated with some of the biggest names in dance music including David Guetta, Chase and Status, Joel Corry and Rudimental, and took home the Brit Award for best dance act in both 2022 and 2023. On paper, it looks like a dream run. In reality, it was anything but straightforward.
One of the more surprising revelations involves her childhood, long before the fame arrived. A photograph from her early years was taken for what the family believed was a legitimate kids’ modelling agency. It turned out to be a scam. Every step of the process came with a price tag, from getting photos taken to submitting them to the agency and receiving them back. The family kept wiring money over, around £100 at a time, and got nothing in return.
Hill’s mum kept the whole thing secret from her dad because the family wasn’t wealthy enough to absorb the losses without it causing real tension at home. Hill reckons her dad probably still doesn’t know about it. As for the modelling dream, she let it go quietly. ‘I was cute until the age of seven, then started to go on the turn,’ she joked.
But the interview covers far more serious ground too. Hill has spoken about coming to terms with sexual assault, something she has clearly had to work through over the years. While she hasn’t gone into extensive detail publicly, the fact that she is addressing it openly as part of looking back on her life is significant, and reflects a broader willingness to be honest about the harder parts of her story rather than just the highlights.
Impostor syndrome has also been a constant companion throughout her career. Despite the awards, the collaborations and the chart success, Hill has described wrestling with a persistent feeling that she didn’t quite belong or deserve the recognition she was getting. It’s something a lot of artists quietly deal with but rarely talk about so directly.
Hill began writing and performing music at just 14, playing in a band called Shaking Trees before The Voice came along and gave her a national platform. The years since have been packed with work, and the output has clearly been the thing keeping her grounded even when everything else felt difficult.
Now she is stepping into a new chapter. Her latest album, titled Rebecca, is set for release on 13 November, and the choice of her full first name feels deliberate. It signals something more personal, more stripped back, a project that is less about the dance floor and more about the person behind the music.
For Hill, looking back seems to be less about nostalgia and more about making sense of a journey that has been messier and more painful than her trophy cabinet might suggest. The music kept her going. Everything else, she says, she could have done without.