Sam Fender has had therapy to tackle his “past traumas”.

The ‘Hypersonic Missiles’ hitmaker admits that as soon as he had “a bit of money” behind him he sought out a psychiatrist to help him process some negative feelings and incidents in his life.

He said: "Once any Geordie does some music and gets together a bit of money behind him, the first thing you do is go to therapy.

"I realised that a lot of the way I react to things, or whenever I've went mental and done bad things and drunk too much of whatever, it all kind of stems back to traumas in the past."

Among the 26-year-old star’s past difficulties was being bullied throughout his school days, but though it was “horrible” at the time, Sam has found the positives in the experience.

In an interview with Big Issue magazine, he said: "I got bullied quite a lot through primary school and high school. Bullying erodes your self-esteem and it's horrible.

"But I feel like it's been a powerful tool for me. It always drove me to strive forward in life."

This festive season, Sam has covered Lindisfarne’s ‘Winter Song’ to raise awareness of homelessness in conjunction with the Big Issue and being able to make a difference is more “rewarding” than any of his commercial success.

He said: "I love making music. It's fantastic and it's great fun. But musicians, we're primarily just entertainers. We're not heroes.

"But to do something like this makes me feel like I'm actually doing something helpful.

"And I think that's more rewarding than playing to 50,000 people. It's more rewarding than any number one."

And it’s a cause that’s particularly important to the singer.

He explained: "My stepdad was actually homeless himself at one point. He was armed forces and he ended up on the street for quite a while.

"One of my friends who passed away, she spent a lot of her years homeless and in and out of shelters.

“It permeated my life when I saw my friend go through the things she went through.

"We've a lot of friends up here who've become homeless over the years.

"It just shows that it's so close to home. People don't realise how close it is."