Ellie Goulding was too shy to speak to Nate Ruess when they first met.
The singer walked past the Fun. frontman in a hotel lobby, and felt too self-conscious to talk.
It turns out the musician felt the same about Ellie, and he avoided talking to her when she walked by.
"We did a tour together in Australia, the Future of Music Tour, myself, Fun., Azealia Banks and a few other artists," she told MTV News. "He walked past me in a hotel lobby, and then emailed me and was like 'I just walked past you and was too shy to say hello.' And I was like 'I was too shy too!'”
The star goes on to explain despite the shaky start to their friendship, they became close quickly. Nate co-wrote Ellie’s new single Goodness Gracious, and she has nothing but respect for his talent.
"We hung out and instantly hit it off. I think he's an amazing songwriter, and I love the way he writes lyrics,” Ellie said. “We went running and then we decided we wanted to write together. We realised we had very similar taste in music, and we just wanted to do something, we didn't care what it was."
The 27-year-old went on to reveal she recently recorded a cover of a James Blake song. While keeping the specific choice of song secret, Ellie admitted it was a “chilled” version of the original track.
"I love his new record, I've always loved him; I think he's incredibly talented ... so I thought I'd give him a little nod and cover one of his songs," she said. "It's kind of a chilled version — the song itself is pretty chilled anyway — so I don't know if I'll perform it [live]. It depends on what the reaction is, we'll see. You know what I do; I just put them out there."
