Anne-Marie

Early life

Anne-Marie Rose Nicholson was born on 7 April 1990 in East Tilbury, Essex, to a mother who is a local teacher and a father who is a builder and handyman from the East End of London. She has an older sister named Samantha. At age five she began attending stage school, and as a child she performed in two West End productions: she auditioned for Les Misérables at six without telling her parents, and at twelve she performed in Whistle Down the Wind alongside Jessie J. She attended St Clere's School at Stanford-le-Hope, where she was involved in performing arts. Her popularity ended at fourteen when she was shunned and bullied after being accused of cheating on her boyfriend, having only spoken to another boy on the phone late at night. She has said she regrets being a difficult child, a situation worsened by her grandmother's death when she was twelve. Ed Sheeran advised her to call her parents every day. As a teenager she began filming herself singing in her room. She later attended Palmer's College in Thurrock. Anne-Marie holds a black belt in Shotokan karate, which she began at age nine. She became a triple world champion, winning double gold at the Funakoshi Shotokan Karate Association World Championships in 2002 and further gold and silver in 2007, as well as gold at the United Kingdom Traditional Karate Federation National Championships. She credits karate with teaching her the discipline and focus needed for her singing career, though touring has made it difficult to find time for the sport.

Career

Anne-Marie's path to a solo career started with a lucky break. After meeting someone by chance, she got studio time at Rocket Studios, which belonged to Elton John. He heard her sing and signed her to a contract. In 2013, she put out a demo called "Summer Girl" on Rocket, and it got a big boost when Ed Sheeran shared a link to it on his Twitter. Her solo plans were paused so she could keep growing as an artist. She then appeared as a guest on songs by Magnetic Man, Gorgon City, and Raized by Wolves, which caught the ear of the group Rudimental. In 2014, they asked her to step in for a singer who had left the band. For the next two years, she toured with them as a vocalist. She also sang on four tracks from their 2015 album We the Generation, including collaborations with Dizzee Rascal and Will Heard, and the song "Rumour Mill," which hit number 67 on the UK Singles Chart. That success gave her the confidence to go solo, and she said she was writing songs every day while on tour.

Her first EP, Karate EP, came out on 10 June 2015 through Rudimental's new label Major Tom's. Josh Record and Two Inch Records produced it, and it had three songs plus a remix. The singles "Karate" and "Gemini" led to her first solo live shows. The Guardian gave a good review to the track "Boy" and said the EP showed she was ready to go it alone. In November, she released "Do It Right," which reached number 90 on the UK Singles Chart and went platinum in Australia.

Her first album was originally called Breathing Fire. In May 2016, she put out "Alarm" as its lead single. It spent a week at number 76 in June, then came back a month later and climbed to number 16, earning double platinum status in the UK. That October, she was booked to play at the 31st Eurosonic Noorderslag festival in Groningen, Netherlands. On 10 October 2016, she appeared on Illy's song "Catch 22." Later that same month, Clean Bandit released "Rockabye," with Anne-Marie as the main vocalist and Sean Paul on the track. It stayed at number one for nine weeks straight and became the Christmas number one. The song went multi-platinum across much of Europe, North America, and Oceania. The Official Charts Company later ranked it as the 57th biggest song of the 2010s in the UK.

Personal life

Anne-Marie has shared that she is attracted to both men and women, but she does not use the label bisexual, explaining that she is simply drawn to whoever she likes. She became a vegetarian in 2018 and tries to eat vegan food when possible. On the Off Menu podcast, she discussed having emetophobia, a fear of vomiting, and said her vegetarian diet helps ease her anxiety about food because she worries about getting sick from meat. In April 2025, she stopped being vegetarian due to gestational diabetes and pregnancy cravings. She has been open about her anxiety, noting that therapy helped her confront her struggles during lockdown. She also has ADHD, dyslexia, and obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). In 2025, she revealed she experienced postpartum depression and anxiety after two closely spaced pregnancies. Anne-Marie began dating British rapper Slowthai in 2022, and he confirmed their relationship in a Rolling Stone interview in February 2023. In 2024, it came out that they had secretly married in Las Vegas in July 2022. Their daughter was born in February 2024. In February 2025, she announced they were expecting a second child, and she gave birth to their son in April 2025. She splits her time between East London and her hometown of East Tilbury in Essex. She is a Manchester United supporter.