Post by Silky on Mar 1, 2006 13:02:59 GMT
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THE BLUNT TRUTH
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He had the biggest selling album of 2005, cracked the US market, sold out two UK tours within the space of six months and last week walked away with two Brit Awards. But do you know everything there is to know about James Blunt? Ahead of his Nottingham Arena sell-out next Friday, SIMON WILSON uncovers some little-known facts about the pint-pot star...
HE was born in a military hospital in Tidworth, Hampshire.
HIS real name is Blount. He changed it for the pop career because he didn't think everyone would be able to pronounce it.
THE Blount family and the military have a relationship stretching back over 1,000 years.
WE know he served in Kosovo as part of a peace-keeping force, stood guard at the Queen Mother's funeral and was a member of the Household Cavalry at Buckingham Palace but did you know he didn't want to do any of it? Aside from the family tradition, he joined up because the Army paid towards his degree course at Bristol University.
HIS degree was in aerospace engineering.
HE was sent off to boarding school at the age of seven.
HE "saved £100" to buy an electric guitar when he was 14 and learned to play along to Nirvana's Nevermind.
"BEING a musician is all I've ever wanted to do," he says, although the first gig he ever went to was his own.
YOU'RE Beautiful is about him seeing an ex-girlfriend with her new bloke. He refuses to say whether he has a girlfriend now. "The girl I end up in bed with at night is my business."
THE video for You're Beautiful was filmed in Majorca. "The rain is fake" he says, "but the 50-foot cliff jump is real.
HIS first Nottingham gig was at the Arena supporting Elton John in December 2004.
HE refers to Elton John as his "fairy godmother".
THOUGH Elton John is credited with discovering him it was actually ex-4-Non Blondes singer Linda Perry, now best known as a songwriter/producer for Pink and Christina Aguilera, who launched his career. She signed him to her Custard record label after seeing him play at the SXSW festival in Texas.
DESPITE the American films, soldiers don't have rock music blasting out as they go into battle. "We didn't have stereos in the tanks... with some kind of metal music going on while we're laying down some fire. You need your ears to hear what's going on."
HIS all-time favourite album is Chill-Out by the KLF.
THE first album he purchased was Pink Floyd's Wish You Were Here when he was about 15 ? "which I know is old for a first record but I didn't know anything about music."
HE has no music hero: "I don't have much of an education in it. We didn't have a CD player in the house."
HIGH has nothing to do with getting stoned. "The lyrics are about a moment I'd spent alone on a clifftop in Devon."
NO Bravery is about "meeting Serb soldiers who were standing around reading a porn mag and laughing, smoking a f*g over the bodies of Kosovo Albanian families they had just murdered".
OTHER famous musicians to have spent time in the army include Jimi Hendrix, Billy Bragg, Shaggy, Huey Morgan from Fun Lovin' Criminals and Terence Trent D'Arby. Elvis Presley is the only one to have joined up after becoming famous.
HE'S had a pilot's licence since the age of 16.
THE songs for Back To Bedlam weren't all written while he served in Kosovo. Some were penned at the home of Star Wars actress Carrie Fisher in Los Angeles. She was a friend of his then-girlfriend's family. "We recorded one of the songs in her bathroom... she brought me soup."
THE BLUNT TRUTH
Next Story | Previous Story | Back to list
Be the first reader to comment on this story
He had the biggest selling album of 2005, cracked the US market, sold out two UK tours within the space of six months and last week walked away with two Brit Awards. But do you know everything there is to know about James Blunt? Ahead of his Nottingham Arena sell-out next Friday, SIMON WILSON uncovers some little-known facts about the pint-pot star...
HE was born in a military hospital in Tidworth, Hampshire.
HIS real name is Blount. He changed it for the pop career because he didn't think everyone would be able to pronounce it.
THE Blount family and the military have a relationship stretching back over 1,000 years.
WE know he served in Kosovo as part of a peace-keeping force, stood guard at the Queen Mother's funeral and was a member of the Household Cavalry at Buckingham Palace but did you know he didn't want to do any of it? Aside from the family tradition, he joined up because the Army paid towards his degree course at Bristol University.
HIS degree was in aerospace engineering.
HE was sent off to boarding school at the age of seven.
HE "saved £100" to buy an electric guitar when he was 14 and learned to play along to Nirvana's Nevermind.
"BEING a musician is all I've ever wanted to do," he says, although the first gig he ever went to was his own.
YOU'RE Beautiful is about him seeing an ex-girlfriend with her new bloke. He refuses to say whether he has a girlfriend now. "The girl I end up in bed with at night is my business."
THE video for You're Beautiful was filmed in Majorca. "The rain is fake" he says, "but the 50-foot cliff jump is real.
HIS first Nottingham gig was at the Arena supporting Elton John in December 2004.
HE refers to Elton John as his "fairy godmother".
THOUGH Elton John is credited with discovering him it was actually ex-4-Non Blondes singer Linda Perry, now best known as a songwriter/producer for Pink and Christina Aguilera, who launched his career. She signed him to her Custard record label after seeing him play at the SXSW festival in Texas.
DESPITE the American films, soldiers don't have rock music blasting out as they go into battle. "We didn't have stereos in the tanks... with some kind of metal music going on while we're laying down some fire. You need your ears to hear what's going on."
HIS all-time favourite album is Chill-Out by the KLF.
THE first album he purchased was Pink Floyd's Wish You Were Here when he was about 15 ? "which I know is old for a first record but I didn't know anything about music."
HE has no music hero: "I don't have much of an education in it. We didn't have a CD player in the house."
HIGH has nothing to do with getting stoned. "The lyrics are about a moment I'd spent alone on a clifftop in Devon."
NO Bravery is about "meeting Serb soldiers who were standing around reading a porn mag and laughing, smoking a f*g over the bodies of Kosovo Albanian families they had just murdered".
OTHER famous musicians to have spent time in the army include Jimi Hendrix, Billy Bragg, Shaggy, Huey Morgan from Fun Lovin' Criminals and Terence Trent D'Arby. Elvis Presley is the only one to have joined up after becoming famous.
HE'S had a pilot's licence since the age of 16.
THE songs for Back To Bedlam weren't all written while he served in Kosovo. Some were penned at the home of Star Wars actress Carrie Fisher in Los Angeles. She was a friend of his then-girlfriend's family. "We recorded one of the songs in her bathroom... she brought me soup."
