David Gray: ‘I wish I could banish Manchester United from my mind'

Telegraph

26-04-2025

How do famous names spend their precious downtime? In our weekly My Saturday column, celebrities reveal their weekend virtues and vices. This week: David Gray
6.30am
I'll probably be woken by a headbutt from one of my two Brussels Griffon dogs – who look like strange furry puffer fish – demanding that I get up and give them breakfast. My wife Olivia's not a morning person so that duty falls to me. I live in Marylebone but most weekends we'll be in our little house on the Norfolk coast.
7am
I accept that after 30 years of going away on tour [Gray is currently on a UK and Ireland tour; davidgray.com/live ] it's my job to make the first coffee of the day, feed Connie and Frank, and let them out.
7.30am
Boiled egg and Marmite soldiers will be our classic breakfast, or if we're trying to be healthy just fruit and yogurt.
9.30am
On a beautiful summer morning when the tide is high, I take the 10-minute walk to the sea and swim. In fact, rain or shine, unless it's blowing a gale, I get into the water. It's a full physical and spiritual reboot, then you're ready for everything.
10.30am
We might go for a long dog walk along the coast but never with headphones or earbuds. I don't want the experience to be polluted. I want to hear the nature around me and be completely connected. I'm so wired to nature it's a time when I'm very present. I'm very in the moment. I'm living the landscape, the birds, the calls, the place, the sound of the wind through the grass, the water. The whole thing is living inside me.
12.30pm
There's a fantastic restaurant in Burnham Market called Socius, which allows dogs, so we'll try to get a table for a light lunch there and I might have a pint of Wherry amber ale. It's top notch. We both love to cook but the Sunday roast is my speciality. Or a nice soup or stew or risotto. Olivia's a little more dexterous and advanced.
1.30pm
We love buying fresh ingredients for the evening meal, so we'll often get fish from the local fishmonger.
2pm
This is when I should build in some meditation time, but I probably don't. I'm very high energy, always thinking, doing, organising, list-making, planning. The only thing I do occasionally do is Pilates.
3pm
I'm trying not to acknowledge it at the moment, but Manchester United's fortunes are still very much part of my Saturday. Their current form means that by the afternoon, my anxiety is usually high. I wish I could banish them from my mind until someone has rescued the club, but I can't.
6pm
There's a strong possibility we'll have friends visiting, so we'll definitely have an aperitif – a little glass of bubbles – to kick off Saturday dinner, which will of course be cooked using only the freshest, locally sourced ingredients.
8.30pm
After dinner we'll play games with more drinks. Cards maybe or nomination whist, but my absolute favourite is Balderdash. I'm a good bullsh---er, particularly when I'm getting hammered. Once, I completed the course and won the game before anyone had got round the first corner. Everyone just kept voting for my ludicrous wordsmithery. I love the creativity and the laughs you can have from the game when everyone is on form.
11pm
If everybody's collapsed into bed, we might watch a series like Slow Horses or The Wire, but my favourite ever show is the French drama Spiral. And strangely last year we got really into Foyle's War. Some of the characters are rather cardboard and the plots are ridiculous but it's like Second World War comfort food and for some reason I just accepted it.
11.30pm
After Olivia has fallen asleep as Foyle's War is so boring, I'll turn the TV off and tell the dogs to get off the bed so they can wake me up again at 4.30am.