It may seem hard to believe, but it’s been 20 years since Busted burst onto the music scene with their debut single, ‘What I Go To School For’.
The song went on to reach number three – becoming the first of eight top 10 singles, including four number ones – and they followed it up with four studio albums, most recently 2019’s ‘Halfway There’. Now, to celebrate two decades in the business, they’re back with a mammoth 26-date arena tour across the UK, as well as a new album, ‘Greatest Hits 2.0’, which sees them reworking some of their biggest tracks with the likes of Simple Plan, Neck Deep, All Time Low, Hanson and the Jonas Brothers.
Ahead of the tour starting next month, I caught up with James, Matt and Charlie to talk about how plans are going, the new album, Charlie’s time on ‘The Masked Singer’ earlier this year, what’s next for the band and more.
How’s the tour preparation going so far?
Matt: It’s been going quite well. I mean, it’s one of those things. It’s like you feel like you’ve got all the time in the world, and then suddenly, you’ve got no time.
Charlie: We’ve actually only got five days left. It’s quite scary.
Matt: Really?!
Charlie: Yeah. So we’re not ready.
Matt: I was looking at two weeks!
Charlie: I know, but there’s lots of stuff in between that. Yeah, so I think it’s gonna be good. I think the show that we’re putting together is awesome. Like, it’s gonna blow people’s minds. Staging is really cool. I think the set’s really good. I think we’re playing well together. It’s all good man. Just got to just kind of hope that when you get there on the night, it all just comes together. And I think it will.
So what can fans that are coming expect from the shows?
Charlie: They can expect everything they love about Busted in one show. It’s like 2004 but way better.
James: If you’re a Busted fan, this is the one to come to.
Charlie: Yeah it is.
Are there any songs you’re particularly looking forward to playing live this time?
Matt: I love ‘Loser Kid’. Like, I’ve always loved that song. But like now I think we play it better than we’ve ever played it.
Charlie: We do. Definitely.
Matt: It’s just really good. And for me personally, it’s got the most fun bassline on the record, like I just love playing it.
Charlie: I love that one. I love the new version of ‘Meet You There’. It’s very cool.
Speaking of the new versions – you’ve got your new album ‘Greatest Hits 2.0’ coming out next month as well. Can you tell us about how you came up with the idea of making it a collaborations project?
Charlie: Do you know what, the credit to that idea actually lies with our manager. He said, “Wouldn’t it be cool if you got…” – actually that’s not totally true. Matt did mention it a few years back. And then I think he’d just said it, and then everyone thought, “oh yeah” and then Matt just lost the credit for the idea. It’s actually Matt’s idea.
Have you got a particular standout track on there?
Charlie: We do a track called ‘Everything I Knew’ with a band called Dashboard Confessional. And they were like, basically, forefathers of the emo scene. Like they were a huge part of that, back in 2001. And I genuinely didn’t think that he [lead singer Chris Carrabba] would say yes when we asked him and then he just came back and said, “yeah, I’d love to do it”. So that’s a real cool thing for us to have.
Matt: I can’t believe he’s on it. Like literally, we listened to their albums all the time. And I went to see them live in London at Shepherd’s Bush. And like, it was the first gig I’d ever been at where it felt like a bit Kumbaya, because everyone was singing every word. Huge singalong. He would just start singing and then everyone would take over. Yeah, and you’re like “I’ve come to watch this fucking guy, but yet I’m singing my head off.”
Charlie: His MTV Unplugged is basically amazing.
Matt: Yeah, it’s a massive singalong. But he was just so cool. And so awesome. And I can’t believe he said yes. He sounds brilliant.
Charlie: Yeah, he sounds amazing.
Matt: He sounds brilliant.
You’ve also all had quite a few different solo projects both in and outside of music as well as being part of Busted. Is there anything you’ve learned from those that you’re putting into this tour and the new album?
Matt: I think you learn musically from everything you do.
Charlie: Yeah, I think, you know, we’re not playing any songs from other projects. But definitely, the more you play, the more you learn. And, you know, when we first started touring, we’d never toured before. We were only a band for like, three years really before we ended the first time. I feel like all of the touring experience that’s really shaped me as a live performer happened after Busted ended. So now coming back to it, I definitely feel all of us are much better than we were – better players, better singers, better everything. So I think that it’s just a much more accomplished show now because we had time to go and do that.
Charlie, I also particularly wanted to ask you about being on ‘The Masked Singer’ – what was that whole experience like for you?
Charlie: It was mad. It was a mad experience, but I really enjoyed it. I thought it was something my kids would enjoy. And then when I actually got there, I was pretty terrified. But I actually had a lot of fun. It was great.
How do you feel that the way you approach your music and performing has changed over the past 20 years?
Matt: Yeah, I think massively, You know, it’s funny, because when I think back to everything we’ve done, I don’t think we take ourselves very seriously, but we’ve always taken our music very seriously, as seriously as you can about writing songs about the future and triple breasted women and the like. But we put a lot of work into it, and we really want to make it the best we can. And I think now, that’s even more so. You know, we all really, really care about it. And we’ll work until we we fall to kind of make something right. And I think that’s the thing with Busted, like it kind of takes over your life. Because we’re not a band all the time. And then when we come together, we have these periods of time where Busted has to be our main priority, because it deserves it. And we appreciate our fans loads, and we want to give them the best we can. Yeah, so everything else kind of falls by the wayside.
Charlie: So I actually think that Busted is… some of our best stuff, it could actually be in front of us, not behind us. So I think that’s a really exciting thing to be here 20 years later thinking, we’ve got a chance now to really do something cool. And see how it goes.
James: Yeah, we’ve got a chance to actually go beyond what we thought.
Matt: And that’s what’s so amazing about Busted, is I think we really have just come into ourselves musically. I think we’re coming into our creative prime in a way. We all get each other, we all know what we can do, we all kind of play to our strengths. And I think that can only produce good shit.
Charlie: Yeah, *good* shit!
Matt: You know? No more of that weak ass shit. Just good shit.
If you were able to go back 20 years and give advice to the younger versions of yourselves, what would you tell them?
Charlie: I actually just answered this question. Mine would be to buy Bitcoin when it was 20p.
James: I feel… best advice younger, I’d probably spend a lot more time learning instruments, more instruments.
Matt: That’s a really good one.
Charlie: Yeah, like for me, I taught myself piano. And it’s quite a slow process for me when I get on the piano, which is annoying. And I would actually go back and learn piano properly.
James: Yes, and the thing is that as well, I feel like things like skateboarding, languages and other musical instruments, I feel like I would have…
Charlie: Language is a good one.
James: I would have honed those things more because I feel like really languages can be really, really valuable. Yeah.
Matt: Like just imagine if we could speak Spanish.
Charlie: That’s the one I’d choose as well. Or Japanese.
Matt: We should all learn Spanish!
James: Or French.
Matt: Can you learn Spanish at 40? Is that something you can do?
I mean, Duolingo exists, right?
Charlie: I think the best way to learn a language at our age is to go and live in the place you’re learning [the language of]. ‘Cause you’re surrounded by it. You’re not gonna dedicate that much time, are you?
Matt: No. I just went to Sweden and I just expected everyone to speak English, and they did [laughs]. Like I’d stand there and they would say something and I’d go, “Oh, hi” and they’d go “Hello. Fucking Brit.”
James: I can speak English, American and Australian so that’s three languages that I’m really good at.
You’ll have to do a Greatest Hits 3.0 with Busted songs in different languages…
Charlie: We could have done that this time. It would have just been a train wreck…
James: We need to do our greatest hits featuring Japanese artists.
Charlie: I love Spain.
Matt: I love Spain. I love South America.
Charlie: Oh yeah, South America!
Matt: I’d love to go to South America. We’ve never been. And I hear from South American fans all the time, “come to wherever”…
James: “Come to Brazil!”
Matt: Yeah, like “come to Brazil, come to all these places”. I’m like, “does anyone fucking know us there?” Yes. You know, so like, I want to go there.
James: I wanna go to Brazil. I’d go to Brazil.
Charlie: We’re currently on the radio in the Philippines. I’d like to go there again.
So next time I talk to you you’ll all be fluent in Spanish?
Matt: Yeah, we’ll be like, “Hola!” That’s all I got [laughs].
I was going to ask what is still on your bucket list as a band…
Charlie: I’d like to go and do headline shows in places we’ve never been, ie Brazil.
Matt: I’d love to go to South America. Like our manager back in the day was always scared to send us because he thought we were gonna get kidnapped. So he wouldn’t ever let us go. He really wouldn’t let us go.
Charlie: He wouldn’t let us ski and he wouldn’t…
Matt: He wouldn’t let us go skiing or get kidnapped. Where’s the fun in that? [laughs] But yeah, I really wanna go there.
James: And Mexico.
Matt: Yeah, I wanna go to Mexico. I might be going to Mexico later this year.
Charlie: Oh really?
Matt: Yeah, maybe.
Is there a song that you’re particularly proud of?
Matt: There’s a song on our last record called ‘Nostalgia’, which I listened to the other day on my drive into work. I just thought, “this is a really, really great song”. And I forgot about it. But I’m really proud of all of our songs.
Charlie: Yeah, I love ‘3AM’.
Matt: Yeah, I like that song.
Charlie: I think that’s just a really awesome song. So every time we play it, I really feel it.
James: I like ‘Year 3000’. Because everywhere I go, people seem to know it.
What’s next for you after the tour and the new album?
Matt: Then it’s about the future. You know, then it’s about what we want to do next, which I think is the most exciting part. You know, it’s kind of going “right, what are we going to do now?” And we have a few ideas about that. I think creatively we’re ready to really…
Charlie: Yeah, we’re gonna do some writing on the tour. Which is gonna be fun because we wrote a lot of our second album on the road and in hotel rooms. We haven’t really done that again.
Matt: I’m looking forward to that. But I am a bit of a baby these days. I like to be in bed before midnight. But no, we get off stage at 11 and then we’re gonna be writing? I’m not gonna be in bed til two o’clock. Who the fuck am I?! [Charlie laughs] But I have a morning routine that has to happen! How do I live these double lives?!
I was going to ask if there were any plans for new music but I think you’ve sort of already answered that now…
Charlie: There are plans that we are looking at right now. Definitely. Once this tour is over, our focus will shift to the next chapter for sure.
Matt: So I mean, you know, I don’t want to be too bold, right? But I feel like at multiple times in the last five years it’s felt like Busted has been completely over or barely begun. And right now I feel like it has barely begun. I feel that we have a real opportunity and something that we want to do that could really grasp people. And I feel that we we almost owe it to to do that.
Charlie: Yeah, like with the shows, none of us genuinely, I genuinely mean this – none of us thought we would be playing 26 arenas on this tour.
Matt: No.
Charlie: I just thought that that was beyond my wildest dreams. Because that is a huge tour, you know. And Matt and James obviously did a big tour with with McFly as McBusted but that was two bands. We’re doing 21 [different arenas] with one band. So it’s pretty crazy to see, that shows the appetite for it.
James: That’s like doing 52 with two bands.
Charlie: So yeah, that just that gave us a real confidence boost. “Oh, fuck, you know, there’s a lot of love out there for us.”
Matt: Yeah. And I think if we can give them something that I don’t even think they realise that they want…
Charlie: Steve Jobs classic.
Matt: Yeah, Steve Jobs classic. We give them something they don’t even realise they need, you know, and I feel that’s what Busted could do. It’s what we did the first time, and I feel like we’re gonna do that again.
Busted’s new album, ‘Greatest Hits 2.0’, is out on 15th September 2023.
See Busted live on tour in the UK and Ireland this autumn:
2 September – Plymouth Pavillions, Plymouth
3 September – Cardiff International Arena, Cardiff
5 September – Swansea Arena, Swansea
6 September – Bournemouth International Centre, Bournemouth
7 September – The Brighton Centre, Brighton
9 September – Utilita Arena, Birmingham
10 September – O2 Arena, London
12 September – Bridlington Spa, Bridlington
13 September – Utilita Arena, Newcastle
15 September – Motorpoint Arena, Nottingham
16 September – Utilita Arena, Newcastle
17 September – First Direct Arena, Leeds
19 September – P&J Live, Aberdeen
20 September – OVO Hydro, Glasgow
22 September – M&S Bank Arena, Liverpool
23 September – Motorpoint Arena, Nottingham
24 September – AO Arena, Manchester
26 September – Cardiff International Arena, Cardiff
27 September – The O2, London
29 September – Utilita Arena, Birmingham
30 September – AO Arena, Manchester
1 October – OVO Hydro, Glasgow
4 October – Motorpoint Arena, Nottingham
6 October – 3 Arena, Dublin
8 October – SSE Arena, Belfast
10 October – The O2, London
