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As he releases a greatest hits album, James Blunt tells ALEX GREEN how Spanish visas, B-sides and bantering with online haters defifined his lockdown
JAMES BLUNT has spent the past 18 months thinking: “What the hell just happened?”
Six albums and six world tours, he explains, have left him with little time to look back since he started his music career in 2005 with the release of You’re Beautiful.
“It’s been really exciting to stop and reflect through this last year, when we were forcibly sent home.
“I’ve spent 17 years touring, or locked in a studio, and it’s been an incredible journey.”
During the enforced time off, the former Army officer, 47, enjoyed spending time with his wife Sofia Wellesley, struggled to secure a Spanish visa and managed to collate a greatest hits album.
“If you have ever wished James Blunt only put one album out, well this is that album,” he says, with his trademark self-deprecation.
These songs, he explains, are not some top 20 ranked in order of popularity a la Spotify.
There are hits – for example 1973 and the aforementioned You’re Beautiful – but they are positioned alongside previously unloved cuts.
These include Smoke Signals – previously only available on a deluxe edition of 2013’s Moon Landing, plus live versions James believes outdo their originals.
Love Under Pressure is one of four new songs. Written with fellow rough-voiced singer-songwriter Jack Savoretti, the track’s main lyrics began as something a little more prosaic.
Mid-lockdown James was at his property in Ibiza, while Jack was in Oxfordshire. “It wasn’t meant to be Love Under Pressure,” he explains. “I was just talking about the pressures of trying to sort out paperwork... a visa for living in Spain.
“But he thought that was a bit of a niche subject that wouldn’t necessarily relate to a wider audience.”
James’s earnest songs are a contrast to his personality. He is quickwitted, deadpan and willing to skewer himself in telling a joke.
His record label must have noted this because they have encouraged him to join TikTok.
“Every album label says there’s a new platform and that you should be on this platform,” he says. “Like all these things. They are quite selforientated and I think the real world has probably more to give.
“But at the same time, I feel very fortunate to have platforms like these which mean that I can have direct contact with people. “I’m only going to mess around.” His best ripostes to haters, however, have come on Twitter. In May, for example, he shared an article announcing he was to become the first performer to play to a full house in a major venue since before the first national lockdown.
“The answer is no. You obviously haven’t suffered enough,” he commented in a re-tweet.
“The real world is a nicer environment with more to offer,” he says of Twitter. “You meet a nicer person generally in the real world than you do in the world of social media, but I enjoy the abuse. And I’ve learned to cash in on it too.”
So how does he deal with the barbs? “It’s a joke because I go on tours around the world and I am lucky enough to play arenas of up to 20,000 people a night.
“There are tens of thousands of people making an effort to come to the shows, paying good money and travelling distances.
“It would be a joke to take the two people online being mean about me or my music seriously, rather than the people who attended the shows. They’re making the effort and deserve recognition and respect.”
James’s return to performing live has been a joy. He admits, however, that the excitement of audiences, post-lockdown, might be making his job too easy.
“There are times when I have thought I could sing them anything,” he jokes. “I could sing them Baa, Baa, Black Sheep and they would all go mental.”
In 2017, James and his wife Sofia became the proud owners of the Fox & Pheasant pub in west London, saving the 175-year-old institution from developers. This led to an invitation from Amazon Prime – to host a beer brewing competition show.
“When I set out in music I thought, ‘What an incredibly fortunate job I have’. And then I bought a pub and I thought I couldn’t have any more fun with this. And now I’ve got a TV show about beer and I get to drink beer.
“I think I’ve died and gone to heaven.”
That is not to say owning a pub during the pandemic has been easy.
“It was very sad to send a band, crew, trucks and buses home when my tour was cancelled,” says James.
“But I appreciated the time at home. I realised I had a family I hadn’t even properly met before.
“Of course, the pub was very sad too, to just close. But that was a great realisation – I bought the pub to stop it being turned into a house but you quickly realise that it’s not the four walls you are saving.
“Your job and responsibility is the staff and to look after them becomes the priority.
“Maybe that was what I took from the pandemic too.”
Now I’ve got a TV show about beer and I get to drink beer. I think I’ve died and gone to heaven...