‘We want to get to number 1’

Busted’s Matt Willis is not impressed with the current state of the music charts.

He’s particularly agitated by the potential threat one piece of work poses to the band’s new album Half Way There.

“That f ***ing Greatest Showman album, oh my God,” he says, lightly seething over a conference call.

“If that knocks us off number one, I’m going to be so pissed off. Can you put a message out? On February 1, stop buying The Greatest Showman, for one week, so ours can get to number one, please?”

In a room at their record label’s London office with his bandmates Charlie Simpson and James Bourne, he adds over the phoneline: “Busted have never had a number one album. It’s f ***ing crazy.”

Back in the early Noughties, the pop-rock group did manage to notch up a handful of number one singles, including Crashed The Wedding and You Said No.

But not one of their three albums have managed to strike number one gold, although the first two, Busted and A Present For Everyone, both peaked at a very respectable number two in 2002 and 2003.

Not that the lack of number ones really had any impact on their success or level of fame - the group were, and are still, very well-known - thanks to their pumping out of infectious, catchy, punk-pop singles about fancying teachers (What I Go To School For) and travelling to a bizarre future filled with triple-breasted women (Year 3000), and their feisty yet fun, accessible persona.

Not to mention their split more than 10 years ago, the catalyst of which was Simpson’s swift exit to pastures new with heavier post-hardcore band Fightstar, leaving Willis and Bourne no choice but to call it a day.

So this, their fourth album and their second since reforming in 2016, is Busted’s chance to finally hit the chart summit.

“Let’s start a campaign!” Simpson bellows from a distant part of the office they’re in, matching Willis’ dedication to the downfall of The Greatest Showman once and for all.

It could prove quite the task to knock the film soundtrack from the number one spot - it has clung on for 28 non-consecutive weeks since its release in December 2017 at time of publication.

Its ongoing success is largely down to streams and downloads, but there’s something about it that is clearly gripping the nation, above and beyond what the rest of the modern charts have to offer.

“We need Nirvana now more than ever,” Willis insists. “You need a guitar band to come out and change the world. I listen to the radio, I don’t connect with anything. I don’t wanna be an old moaning dickhead, but I really don’t.

“I listen to Radio 1, and I’m like, ‘What the f *** is all this stuff?’. I’m not living in the past, I’m just not excited by the future.”

In agreement, Bourne pitches in: “When you have music with instruments that are played by people, there’s a feeling you can’t really get from when you process stuff on computers.

“It’s all electronic. You lose the human feel that music has. The further back in time you go, the more music sounds like music.”

Getting that human feel back is a big priority to Busted and, while their 2016 record Night Driver erred on the alternative pop, synthy side of things, Half Way There marks a sort-of return to the sound that made them famous way back when but in a more mature way.

“What we did with Night Driver, I was really excited about, so that kind of made sense,” says Simpson.

“But this record, although it’s kind of going back to the original sound, it’s a much more grown-up rock sound.”