JAMES BLUNT: A Life Less Ordinary
As his hit album Back to Bedlam celebrates its twentieth anniversary re-release, Maya Boyd reflects on island antics with the Ibiza-based, multi-platinum album-selling artist.
It is a midweek summer morning and James Blunt is at home in the north of Ibiza. Behind him are whitewashed finca walls, carved Moroccan-style mirrors and sunlight-flooded doorways through which rolling hills and bougainvillea can be seen. Fresh from a workout, a fluffy-haired Blunt chats amiably to houseguests in Spanish as birdsong filters through the late morning haze. It is a peaceful scene of Balearic idyll and a far cry from his role on the front line of the Kosovo War in 1999. So just how did James Blunt – military son, public schoolboy and the epitome of English charm – go from decorated army captain to multi-platinum award-winning artist to nightclub-owning, tuktuk-driving, Ibiza-dwelling father of two? His trajectory, it is fair to say, has been anything but predictable.
«AS THE CRITIC-decimating, TROLL-SLAYING, SELF-STYLED KING OF X, BLUNT IS arguably THE FUNNIEST MAN IN POP»
James Blunt was born in a military hospital in Wiltshire, England in 1974. His father, a career army officer, moved posts frequently, and at seven years old Blunt was sent to boarding school. Upon discovering music – ‘we didn't really have an outlet for emotion in our school system: music was a way of capturing my feelings very intensely and deeply’ - Blunt played and performed throughout his young years, recording early demos and noting that music allowed him to connect more easily with his peers. ‘I think I knew early on that rather than being an alpha male or a beta male, I was a gamma male, and had to do things differently.’ It wasn’t until a holiday with a schoolmate’s family at 13, however, that Blunt discovered two things that would change the course of his life forever – Ibiza, and nightclubs. ‘We stayed at my friend’s house in Siesta. We went out and danced in all these funny little local nightclubs in Santa Eulalia. Pacha was still a world away, but I knew I’d get there. It was very much on my radar.’ School was followed by a stint in the Armed Forces, and Blunt briefly toyed with the idea of other careers; at one time, I was rather interested in being a lawyer. I went to the Royal Courts of Justice and attended to the testimony of a chap named John Smith, who was accused of having sexual relations with a cat. At that stage I realised perhaps I didn't want to be a lawyer anymore.’
When his debut studio album –Back to Bedlam- was released in 2004, Blunt was just 30 years old. The album would go on to sell more than 12 million copies worldwide and become the best-selling album of the 2000s in the UK. Blunt became a household name overnight and went on tour for the better part of two-and-half years. Rootless and newly world-famous, Ibiza became his second home. ‘I loved the island. I’d always loved the island. But when the chaos of Back to Bedlam really hit, that’s when I needed the island.’ Ibiza became a refuge of sorts, an escape where a tour-frazzled Blunt could hole up incognito with a glamourous coterie of London’s society set, Ibiza old-timers and a not-insignificant cohort of A-list celebrities. It was in fact while he was on tour that Blunt’s parents – ably assisted by television explorer and former army buddy BruceParry – scoured the island for a home for him. ‘My parents realised very quickly that Ibiza had this very peaceful, rural side to it that was the perfect antidote to my life elsewhere. They looked at more than 20 properties for me. When they saw this one, they handed over the phone over to Bruce, who just said, “you lucky little fucker”’.
For over a decade, Blunt was at the heart of an exotic Ibiza scene that revolved around speedboats to Formentera, the VIP room at Pacha, and afterparties in the far-flung campo. The crew was young, fast and reckless, and Blunt’s pool bar, with its now-legendary pink neon sign proclaiming “Blunty’s Nightclub: Where Everybody’s Beautiful” was the backdrop to more debauched nights than anyone could care (or possibly endeavour) to remember. There was the night that the late DJ Erick Morillo was convinced to come and play, only to have him see the modest size of the nightclub and ask for his driver to be called. The time when David Guetta walked in and ‘walked out five minutes later’. There was the plastic store mannequin – Nadia – who ran the “door”, complete with clipboard and minidress, and there was the dressing-up box stashed with hats from every country Blunt had ever toured in. The singer recalls the rapper P. Diddy – upon hearing that Blunt had opened a nightclub – sending 400 bottles of Cîrocvodka. ‘In the first year, my mate Billy and I drank 50 of them.'
It is stories like this that are the stitches in the tapestry of Blunt’s repertoire. Anecdotes about Hollywood stars, tales of ridiculous antics – he once cut singer Ed Sheeran’s face with a sword during a duel at Prince Andrew’s house - and self-aware comments about his own public persona pepper a side-splitting comedic narrative that covers everything from favourite hobbies– ‘skiing, nightclubs and booze’ - to terrorising (his own) children with Darth Vader masks and burying ex-girlfriend’s wedding dresses in the garden. Blunt’s acerbic wit and droll, deadpan delivery have become a signature, and in recent years it’s fair to say that his humour has jostled with his music for top billing. Revered for his role as the critic-decimating, troll-slaying, self-styled King of X (formerly known as Twitter), he is arguably the funniest man in pop. (Top tweet: ‘Who the fuck invited James Blunt to the Invictus Games?’ Blunt: ‘Prince Harry. By text. BOOM!’).
«BLUNT’S POOL BAR, WITH ITS NOW-LEGENDARY PINK NEON SIGN PROCLAIMING “Blunty’s Nightclub: Where Everybody’s Beautiful” HAS BEEN THE BACKDROP TO MORE DEBAUCHED NIGHTS THAN ANYONE COULD CARE (or possibly endeavour) TO REMEMBER.»
While no longer quite so young and reckless – in 2014 Blunt married the esteemed British lawyer and environmental rights advocate Sofia Wellesley, with whom he has two children – he is still as passionate as ever about Ibiza. Many of the singer’s more outrageous island antics ended up in Loosely Based on a Made-Up Story, 2023’s wildly entertaining (and largely misleading) “fictional memoir”. Given his own often rocky relationship with the press and public, it might be said that Blunt gets a kick out of poking the proverbial bear. ‘People love me or they hate me. I probably get on well in the music industry because I can be incredibly shallow. I think it is very bizarre that in our society we choose to take musicians and actors so seriously. Actors are just reading someone else's lines. Musicians are just glorified court jesters. And yet we put them on a pedestal and expect them to become role models. It's farcical.’
Farcical as it may be, the industry has largely been good to Blunt. Having recently turned 50, later this year he will release back to Bedlam – ‘it’s the only album people ever bought, so my label and I agreed that it’s the only one we need to be putting out’ - as a 20th-anniversary package complete with early demos. He’ll tour the album in its entirety once more, along with subsequent hits, and doubtless garner legions of new fans in the process. But with seven albums, two books and a cool 20 million album sales under his belt, does James Blunt really still care about success? ‘When I left the army to pursue a music career, my father was nervous that I was being impulsive. I tried to explain to him that my measure of success was not the same as his. I measure success by degrees of happiness. Am I having fun? Are the people around me having fun? Are my family happy? Then great. The work is done.’
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