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Rylan Clark has said he now ‘hates being made to sing’ after his time on The X Factor.
The presenter, 35, shot to fame on the talent competition in 2012, finishing in fifth place.
However, he came under fire during his time on the show, with judge Gary Barlow once storming off stage and later calling him a ‘joke act’ and ‘talentless’.
Rylan has now spoken about the impact his time on the show had on his confidence and drive to perform.
During the final episode of his BBC travel series Rob and Rylan’s Grand Tour, he told co-host Rob Rinder how he had been forced to perform songs he wasn’t comfortable with and felt like the laughing stock.
‘Every week I was thrown into the lion’s den doing stuff that I didn’t know and not having enough time for it,’ he shared.
‘It’s like an internal thing now when you’ve been through that experience.
‘When someone goes, “Go on, just do it”, it makes me go, “I can’t, I can’t just go and do it”.’
He continued: ‘I feel like I’ve worked so hard to move away from that f***ing idiot’ that I was perceived as that character who couldn’t sing. That can f*** someone up majorly.’
In the final episode of his travel series, Rob had surprised Rylan with the chance to sing with an opera concerto, but the presenter looked incredibly uncomfortable and left the room after insisting he didn’t want to take part.
Speaking to the camera, he later shared: ‘My job on X Factor wasn’t to be the singer and I knew that, so I played that role. My job was to be the joke act, the one everyone would speak about and be on the front page of the paper every day.
‘If I’ve learned anything on this Grand Tour, it is that there’s more to me than that.
‘I’m not thick, I’ve got more to give than just being that idiot on the telly with the shiny teeth.’
He added that ‘finding the real me’ was what signing up to the show was ‘all about’.
Admitting he previously went through ‘such a bad time’ when performing, Rylan eventually decided not to sing with the group.
After appearing on the talent show, Rylan went on to win Celebrity Big Brother that same year, going on to also front shows including Big Brother’s Bits on the Side, Strictly’s It Takes Two and more recently, the Eurovision Song Contest.
However last month he admitted he never had any intention of signing up for The X Factor and only did so because his car broke down.
‘I never intended what happened for me, to happen. I’ll tell you the Gods honest truth, the reason I went on X Factor was my car just broke down, right? Patsy the Peugeot, long may she rest,’ he told The Mirror.
‘I thought, if I could go on that show, last one week of live shows, get a couple of gigs in some gay clubs, earn about 20 grand, I’ll be able to get a new Patsy, buy my mum a new front door, and might be able to start renting somewhere on my own as I was still living with my mum at the time.’
He went on add that he now had ‘built three houses and drives a Range Rover’ so he had clearly ‘done alright’.
Metro.co.uk has contacted Fremantle Media, who produced The X Factor, for comment.
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Rob and Rylan’s Grand Tour is streaming on BBC iPlayer.
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