It’s impossible to not love Jay Sean. Impossible. Even the most cranky, snobby, hater-y old farts in the universe would feel their icy little hearts melt in his warm and sunny presence. We should know — we met him in person and fell for him. Hard.

You’d think that after fusing bhangraand R&B for the British mainstream, after charting in countries around the world, after knocking out the Black Eyed Peas to the #1 spot in the US with “Down,” after breaking through as the first Punjabi Sikh Brit in the American Urban R&B scene… after all this, you’d think the man would be little full of himself. A little tight-lipped and formal. Maybe not the same person who used to tell us dumb jokes on purpose and talk about being chubby as a kid or about “chopping up a woman’s arse” (he meant dissection!) in medical school.

Nope. The Asian Sensation is still himself — funny, honest, teasing, earnest, and heart-breakingly sweet. We got a little private time with Jay Sean on the eve of his new album (Freeze Time) release, and asked him stuff that maybe we weren’t supposed to… like very nosy questions about his personal life. And much to our surprise, he not only joked around about it (boobies!), he talked about what it’s like seeing other Desis come up, becoming successful, and knocking down stereotypes (he even did The Simpson’s Apu accent!). He also told us hysterically funny stories on everything from all the names he picked before going with Jay Sean to what it’s like to hang out with Jay-Z.

The world sees Desis a little differently because of him, and he wears the mantle of “role model” pretty well. He’s now on the cusp on establishing himself in the pantheon of nationality-less global superstars, belonging to everyone who hits a dance floor ready to sweat. So it’s nice to know that when you catch him alone, he’s still really okay with being just Kamaljit Singh, and he’s still up for making us laugh.