When YouTube sensation and singer Conor Maynard touched down in Abu Dhabi to perform at the first ever Nickelodeon kids Choice Awards in the Middle East, we caught up with him to talk slime, collaborations and the future of YouTube.
Welcome to the UAE! What are you most excited about?
I am really excited to perform at the Kids Choice Awards. What I am looking forward the least is being slimed! I really hope I don’t get slimed, I’m not really feeling it.
Why are you so anti-slime?
Funnily enough I used Nickelodeon slime for a movie I did a few months ago in America and it was impossible to clean up afterwards. Eventually we just gave up and said to the location that we would just pay for however much it costs to get rid of it.
You are referred to as a YouTuber, how does that affect your music?
My whole career started on YouTube and I put my covers up online initially – and in fact still do put them and my remixes on my YouTube channel now, but my main thing is my actual music. It’s what I most enjoy working on.
What’s happening in your world right now?
Right now I’m directing my own music videos, which is a lot of fun and something I’ve always wanted to do. It makes it much more personal for me as it means the story is coming directly from me. I really enjoy doing it.
What is the future looking like for YouTube and YouTubers?
It’s definitely becoming very saturated. There’s a lot of people who want to do it now and so it’s becoming more and more difficult to stand out, but maybe that just means the most creative will rise to the top, which is the way it should be.
What tips would you give to kids hoping to make a career out of being a YouTuber?
If it’s something you truly love and truly enjoy I wouldn’t look at it as just a quick way to make money as honestly it’s not that simple – it can look like it is, but to stand out and get noticed is incredibly difficult to do. But if it is genuinely your passion and you want to create video content whatever the genre, then do it! And don’t get too worked up around the numbers – if you love doing it, then do it regardless of how well it does.
You did a collaboration with Pixie Lott, is there anyone else you would like to work with?
There are loads of people I’d love to work with. I really wanted to do a single with Billie Eilish when she first started out and now there’s literally a queue so not sure I will make that happen right now, but maybe one day, we’ll see.
www.youtube.com/conormaynard
