Updated

Updated · The Guardian · Sep 16

Orville Peck Details 2023 Overdose and Sobriety on 'Mule' Ahead of Sept. 18 Release

Updated

Updated · The Guardian · Sep 16

Orville Peck Details 2023 Overdose and Sobriety on 'Mule' Ahead of Sept. 18 Release

Q: What dark reality behind Orville Peck's theatrical mask pushed his management to issue a life-or-death ultimatum before his latest tour?

It was Peck’s severe addiction crisis — escalating alcohol and drug abuse that culminated in a self-inflicted, near-fatal overdose and suicide attempt in a New York hotel in June 2023. Peck said he was “a bad addict” and a “coping alcoholic” after a breakup sent him into a downward spiral. His management found him the morning after the overdose and told him he had to cancel the tour and get treatment or risk losing the team around him. According to broader reporting, the message was effectively: get clean, or he would be on his own. That moment became the turning point behind Mule, the album Peck has described as a chronological account of collapse, rehab, relapse and eventual sobriety. He later entered treatment, initially resisted it, briefly returned to partying, and said he finally got sober in November 2023.

1 articles · Updated · The Guardian · Sep 16

Orville Peck says “Mule,” due Sept. 18, chronicles the “most important year” of his life, including a 2023 overdose, a breakup and the recovery that followed.
June 2023 marked the crisis point: after a night of heavy drinking and drugs before a sold-out Madison Square Garden show, Peck says management told him to cancel his tour and get help or lose their support.
A month in rehab did not end the spiral, he said, and only after another frightening binge in November 2023 did he quit drinking; Peck says he has not had a drink since.
The 38-year-old frames the album as a blunt memoir rather than his usual masked mythology, tracing how fame, loneliness and a split between performer and private self fed his addiction.
Peck, who recently made his Grand Ole Opry debut and publicly mourned Dolly Parton in London, said the record aims to face that damage directly rather than seek pity.