‘I just feel inadequate…’ Inadequate? ‘One hundred per cent. It’s just the person I am’ Amy Macdonald tells CHARLES HUTCHINSON.

LUXEMBOURG on Wednesday, York on Saturday, such is the quick change of scenery on the road for Scottish singer-songwriter Amy Macdonald.

“I’m in Luxembourg,” Amy said when this interview was arranged at very short notice yesterday, not knowing where she would be when the call was put through. “It’s part of a European tour, although it’s only half a tour.”

Only half? “We did the first half before Christmas, but then I didn’t feel too well,” says Amy.

The Glaswegian musician will be playing York for the first time since August 2007, when, at the age of 19, she drew a full house to Fibbers amid an industry buzz in the week of release of her debut album, This Is The Life.

The album went on to top the charts in five countries and became one of the top 20 best-selling albums in Britain by a UK female artist. Second album A Curious Thing hit the top ten in ten European countries in 2010 and last July she issued her third, Life In A Beautiful Light, on the Melodramatic label.

So far Amy has sold more than four million albums worldwide and played to half a million people, but did she ever envisage such sustained success?

“This whole industry is completely unpredictable. You never know how it will go. That’s not a bad thing; it’s just that you can’t expect anything, so I feel lucky and very grateful that I was given such an amazing opportunity at 19,” she says.

“I’ve always worked hard and always tried my best and I’m just thankful that it’s worked out so well – and I’ve absolutely enjoyed it along the way.”

Amy emerged as a fully formed songwriter in her teens… “I’m not sure about that,” interjects Amy. “When I was that age, I just did what I did and hoped for the best and I still don’t class myself as a songwriter.”

Really? “I still listen to other people and wish I could write like that: songwriters like Bruce Springsteen or modern bands like Mumford & Sons, where I never see myself in the same light.”

Is this false modesty? “Not really. I just feel inadequate…”

Inadequate? “One hundred per cent. It’s just the person I am. It’s just how I’ve always been. You don’t get over that feeling; you just deal with it,” says Amy.

What circumstances suit her best for writing a song? “I don’t write that often. I’m not that prolific. I need to be off [duty/the road], at home and inspired. I’ll never force myself to write a song,” she says. “When I’m busy, I don’t have time to think about it, so I really have to have the time off to start writing.”

Amy, who writes alone, is happy with the two-yearly cycle of writing, recording, releasing and touring each album, and so too are her band members and her record label.

“I’ve never been a person who feels the pressure to do an album every year, and I’ve been lucky that my record company has always understood that I need time to write on my own,” she says.

Ask Amy how her song-writing has developed in the past six years, and she says: “I can’t say I’ve thought about it much. I still feel like a child. I’m still only 25!

The way I write songs hasn’t changed, but naturally you grow up, you have more experience and there are more things that you take inspiration from: everyday life, your family life, or things that go on in the world or are in the news, as I’m an emotional person who responds to what I feel.”

When those emotions strike, she reaches for her guitar, and it is always a guitar first, before a pen.

Amy is in no rush to begin work on her fourth album. “It’s always important to take a break,” she says. “I do that at home, in Glasgow, because when you spend all that time travelling, the last thing you want to do is stand around at another airport.”

• Amy Macdonald plays York Barbican on Saturday; doors open at 7pm. Tickets: £19.50 to £29.50 on 0844 854 2757, yorkbarbican.co.uk or in person from the Barbican box office, Monday to Friday, 10am to 2pm.