As Grammy-nominated Mario prepares to release an introspective new album, he tells Page Six that he doesn’t regret sharing his personal life in the past.
In 2007, the star allowed MTV to chronicle his mother’s battle with addiction in the documentary “I Won’t Love You to Death.” But Mario — who says his latest music reveals “my perspective on the world” — tells us, “I never regretted talking about my mother because it’s my life. It’s real. There’s nothing to hide — no regrets at all.”
In the film, Mario confronts his mom, Shawntia Hardaway, about her drug use. She passed away last year. He says: “I think about my mother all the time. The last time I cried about her was at the funeral. I don’t think crying or tears always necessarily express your pain or your thoughts for someone. For me, I do a lot of things eternally, you know what I mean? I process things differently because honestly I’ve seen a lot of death in my family. I’m used to seeing that.”
Mario also told us about his complicated feelings about the music industry: “I never had love for the industry. I don’t think it is something to love. I think it’s something to experience and you use it as a reference as you move forward. It is a platform for you to create on.” He said there are “certain people that I have love for in the music business” but that “I think when you fall in love [with the industry as a whole] too much you kind of get lost in it. I have never gotten lost.”
The Baltimore native dropped a new track “Drowning,” from his album “Dancing Shadows,” due out this fall.