James and Matt found each other when Tom took over the vocals and rocked out face to face on their guitars. Matt would later say on McBusted: The Birth, ‘It was awesome, it felt right, it felt good – and it just felt great seeing James on a microphone [just] over there [from me]. And it felt right being on a stage with McFly as well. It felt homely.’
‘Homely’ wasn’t quite the adjective the audience would have used. The unholy union of McFly and Busted was proving to be shockingly explosive, high-energy and super, super fun. Danny and Dougie couldn’t help singing along even when they weren’t on vocals. The five of them out front ran, jumped, strode and spun across the stage. Even Dougie took a whole section to sing on his own. It was irrepressibly entertaining. Tom was head-banging as he played his guitar. This was the first time he’d ever played the song he’d co-written in front of an audience; he and McFly had used it for sound checks in the past, but that definitely didn’t count. What counted was this unique, special rendition of a near-ten-year-old song, which had aged as well as the whisky Dougie used to neck night after night.
The audience screamed harder as the five of them onstage, on cue, did a massive, collective jump into the final chorus. Danny freestyled over the top as the others sang along, layering the sound like groupies in a bed. The band simply looked like five very, very cool guys with guitars. And, while the music was at times shouted rather than sung, everyone was having far too much fun to care. Wouldn’t anyone scream their head off if they were let loose on the stage to sing ‘Air Hostess’ in front of 5,000 fans?
As the guitarists gathered round Harry’s drums for the climax to the track, James wheeled his arms like Elvis. There were new Kings of Rock and Roll now – and they were called McBusted.
Harry stretched his arms high and brought them crashing down on his cymbals to finish the song. The lights went to black-out. There was a full-throated laugh from someone on the stage in the darkness – maybe Matt. Maybe any of them. They were all beaming from their faces to their toes, and their expressions mirrored those of their audience, many of whom had raised their fingers to the air to fashion a heart shape in silhouette. The guys’ pleasure in their performance, and in performing with each other, was tangible – especially when James, Matt and Tom briefly took to the mics to greet each other (cue crazy screams). Matt was the one who got the rock-star moment: ‘Hello, Royal Albert Hall!’
And with that it was time for another song. ‘Shine a Light’ is anthemic at the best of times. Tonight, it heralded the start of something new, and shone a light into the future. James and Danny faced each other to play their guitars as Tom took the first vocals. Matt was at the front of the stage, rocking out with the crowd. Danny and James took over the vocals for the bridge, James harmonising with Danny’s voice. And it was Matt who landed the soaring chorus. His musical-theatre training lifted his vocals higher than a bird’s, and he sang with his eyes squeezed shut, relishing the moment. The lyric might have been about being on his own, but he was anything but. He had a whole band alongside him.
For James and Tom, the song was an opportunity to jam together. Shoulder to shoulder, comrades and guitars in arms, they played their hearts out. Matt knelt before Dougie as they played their basses with obvious enthusiasm. As Matt took the chorus again, McFly were bouncing off the walls and on the stage – up and down, up and down. James joined his old bandmate on the ‘yeah’ moments, and then Danny lifted his mic stand high in the air to capture the chorusing of the crowd.
As the song segued into a slower segment, the lights turned blue and Tom took things down a notch as his softer voice carried the song. James, getting lost in the moment, let the occasion run away with him and started moonwalking in a circle, just like his idol Michael Jackson. Harry, looking over his drums towards the singers, caught him at it and smiled knowingly to himself at his bandmate’s batty behaviour.
And then the beat kicked in strongly again, Harry beat the life out of the drums and the five guitarists – on Danny’s command of ‘Jump, jump!’ – went back to the unified bouncing. The call-and-return split of the chorus was divided up between them, James and Tom on one part while the others did the rest. Matt and Danny had a rock-voice-off at the end, splitting the final lines of the song between them as James and Tom jammed on their guitars. But they were both winners. Fun and energy zoomed off the stage, rattled round every one of the 9,997 speaking pipes of the Albert Hall’s organ and hit the famous flying saucers of the roof. It was somehow apt for such a sci-fi-mad band.
They were nearing the end now. They gathered round Harry’s drums again. From left to right: Tom, James, Danny, Matt, Dougie. On cue, they leaped into the air – McBusted united – and landed as one. McBusted had arrived.
The lights faded to black. For almost a full minute, the stage was dark and no music played. All the audience could hear was some indistinct excited chatter. It didn’t take much to imagine the high-fives being exchanged by the six members of the new band.
The set had lasted a little over twelve minutes in total.
McBusted would last a little longer than that.
Monday, 11 November 2013, wasn’t a particularly chilly day – it was a mild 7 degrees Celsius on the bustling London streets outside – but the atmosphere inside the stunned press-conference room at the Soho Hotel was as warm as hot fudge sauce, and just as sweet.
One by one, McBusted filed into the room. Danny led the way, followed by Dougie, Matt, James, Tom and Harry; the McFly boys sandwiching two-thirds of Busted between them. On the wall behind the band, an image was projected. It had the height chart from Busted’s iconic debut album artwork – except this time, instead of showcasing three criminally good musicians, there were six. Stamped across it, in bright red, was the new McBusted logo.
The guys needed someone to introduce them and run the Q&A. Someone like an experienced TV presenter who had just landed the main Big Brother presenting job would be good. Happily, Matt Willis was married to her. Emma welcomed the journalists and cracked a couple of jokes about it being ‘bring your wife to work’ day.
And then the guys revealed the news to end all news: McBusted were going on a rip-roaring, all-rocking, sextet-tastic tour. Eleven dates. Eleven arenas. Six bandmates.
It was going to be carnage.
For James, it was the most exciting news ever. So exciting, in fact, that he’d been camped out at the Soho Hotel for the past two days, just counting down to this very press conference. He said to the assembled journalists, ‘I was like a really excited kid [ready] to go on holiday, with my backpack [on, waiting] in the car . . . the flight wasn’t till Monday, but I checked in on Friday.’
And now they were all ready to rock and roll.
James announced the news on his Facebook page: ‘I’m back in a band, and not just any band, a superband. McBusted will be touring from April next year. Get your tickets from Friday 15 November 2013.’
The pop world was agog at the news. The biggest talking point was the name. McBusted? Really? As the Backstreet Boys would later famously say, ‘It sounds like a sandwich.’ Were they a band or a burger?
It was something the guys themselves were all too aware of. Matt Willis, for one, hadn’t even anticipated that the new band would have a name. He said to Showbiz 411, ‘I never thought it was going to be called McBusted. I thought it was going to be “Busted and McFly play the hits of Busted and McFly.”’
Harry interrupted the interview to make a correction: ‘McFly and Busted.’
Perhaps it was just as well a new name had been created . . .
So McBusted it was – somehow. Matt said to a fan in a YouTube interview, ‘It was like, in the meantime, before we think of something cool, we’ll just call it McBusted . . . and then [we were like], “Oh, we’ve announced the tour [and we’re all being interviewed] – oh no!”’ Too late. He added to 5 NewsTalk Live, ‘I always thought it was a joke, and that someone was going to come up with something better, but it just kind of stuck, and now we are McBu
sted for ever.’ James joked to the same fan as Matt, ‘Does it look like we thought hard about our name?’
PopJustice.com had an opinion, saying, ‘We’d argue that the trick with these compound names is that neither name should appear in full, which is why McFlusted is about 87 per cent better than McBusted, but it’s too late to change so there you go.’
The band were sticking to their guns. Harry explained the reasoning behind it to Showbiz 411. They hadn’t just plucked it out of the air; a little bit of brainstorming had gone on. He said, ‘It’s like Busted-Fly, Bust-Fly – it doesn’t work. McBusted just works.’ Danny added in a fan video, ‘There was just no other choice.’ As was so often the case, it was Tom who settled the matter once and for all: ‘When people would refer to us they’d naturally call us McBusted, and it just kind of stuck.’ And there was one member of the new group who had almost known from the start that this was the way it had to be. For Harry, whose friends had used to rib him about McFly being a mini ‘McBusted’, the name seemed like fate.
People couldn’t help but notice the significance of the venue for the announcement: the Soho Hotel was the location where Busted had chosen, in 2005, to reveal they were splitting up. Earlier in 2013 – in January – James had given a solo interview to The Vault, and it was still too painful for him to talk about it, even then. He’d said, ‘Yeah, upset doesn’t really cut it. I can’t even watch the video of the conference because it’s just . . . it’s a lot . . .’ His voice had petered out.
This was one video he was going to want to watch over and over again. He said to Showbiz 411, ‘We loved being in the band and were sad for it to end. But this is such a surprise that we even get to do this again. This is really exciting for us.’
Matt, at the press conference, acknowledged the significance of the venue. ‘It’s good to be here for something positive, because last time was quite depressing,’ he deadpanned.
James, meanwhile, was disbelieving at their good fortune. ‘We didn’t think we’d ever come back. We never thought that we would ever play any of this music ever again.’
As Matt put it on McBusted: The Birth, ‘It was now or never.’ The clock had been ticking, and time had been running out for the boys to revive their favourite group. Yet as the seconds had ticked away, getting closer and closer to the now-or-never moment, the explosive nature of the McBusted bomb that had detonated when the timer hit zero surprised even them. And it wouldn’t have happened if Matt, in particular, hadn’t kept coming back to the idea – year after year after year. He said jokingly, yet with some sincerity to The Vault, ‘If I’m honest, I always thought we would [reunite]. I kept the dream alive!’
James was more circumspect; he had been burned too many times not to be. ‘I probably dreamed that we would, but honestly, if you’d asked me before, I would genuinely have said no,’ he said to The Vault. ‘I didn’t want to do something that was going to be really sad. And it can be perceived to be really sad to come back as half a band. The way this whole supergroup happened was amazing; I got so excited about it . . . We did want to do something and the way everything happened naturally with McFly has just been a real blessing for all of us.’
The question on everybody’s lips was: what about Charlie? There was no six-foot-something, indie-music-loving model in the line-up; that was plain to see. For so long, he’d blocked the idea of a Busted reunion, and it seemed he still wasn’t prepared to join his former bandmates onstage again – but at least their previous animosity had been completely laid to rest. James said at the press conference, ‘He’s not ready to do this yet. We don’t know if he will, but we are good friends. Some people like to make out that we don’t get along because it’s good drama – but we are actually good friends.’ And Matt said to Daybreak, ‘The door’s open [for Charlie]. Maybe hopefully one day . . .’
James added to Showbiz 411, ‘He’s fine with this, he’s very supportive; we’re supportive of him.’ It had been a long time coming, but it seemed there was peace at last.
The papers, however, were full of the story that Charlie had been paid a little sweetener for his share of the Busted name: a little sweetener rumoured to be in the region of six figures. Whatever the facts, he was definitely backing his former bandmates’ decision to form McBusted. Charlie publicly tweeted, ‘Just wanted to say that though I am not joining @mattjwillis and @jamesbourne on their new venture, I wish them all the very best with it!’
A ‘source’ told the Mirror, ‘Charlie wishes the boys lots of luck but he wanted absolutely no involvement . . . All three sat down amicably and worked out a figure that everyone was happy with. Charlie made it clear in no uncertain terms that that’s it for him and the boys now, it’s finished.’
For McBusted, it was just beginning. And everyone wanted to know how the band had got together – whose idea was it? That was something the boys had a lot of fun with in interviews. On Daybreak, Harry was the man. On 5 NewsTalk Live, it was Dougie. The bassist said blithely, ‘It was all my idea, the supergroup. I got everyone together.’
In truth, it was those gigs at the Royal Albert Hall that had cemented it all. Danny told The Vault, ‘When we performed at the Albert Hall, we knew there was magic onstage. It was amazing.’ It had been such a special occasion that all six friends had instantly thought, This is something we have to do. As Matt might have put it via one of his solo songs, it was too incredible a union to let it go to waste. They had to give it life and let it fly. It was Harry who referenced the decade-long bond between the six of them at the press conference, saying, ‘We’ve always got on so well with Matt and James . . . It’s our ten-year anniversary – it’s a time to celebrate and have fun and we just thought, Why not?’
Going on tour was a prospect they couldn’t stop grinning about. Tom said in the press conference, ‘You couldn’t wipe the smile off our faces. It was the most excited we’d been in ten years.’ It felt like everything had fallen into place, so much so that Tom revealed in the VT McBusted: The Birth that the tour was ‘the obvious thing to do’.
The McBusted tour may have been obvious to Tom – but it turned out Danny was the last to know. He revealed on Fearne and McBusted, ‘For some reason I was the last to find out about this. For some reason our manager Fletch thought I wouldn’t want to do it. I don’t know why. When Fletch sat me down on the tour bus, he said, “Just so you know, Danny, I’ve come to you last because I wanted to check with everybody else. [He paused] I sort of knew that everybody else would be up for doing it. I was worried that you wouldn’t really want to do it, that it wouldn’t be your thing.”
‘I was like, “What?!”
‘“Going on tour with Busted; you know, joining the two bands.”
‘I just went, “F**k yeah! That’s amazing!” I was so excited.
‘And he was like, “Wow. This is amazing. This is all going to work, then.”’
What had really made it work in the first instance was, of course, James’s gig at the Manchester Apollo, which had sparked off the whole idea of the supergroup. And Tom gave credit where it was due. He said magnanimously to The Vault, ‘I think the crowd at Manchester that night can take credit.’
The enthusiasm was unstoppable.
The band just hoped, now, that potential ticket buyers would feel the same as they did. To fill eleven arenas would take an awful lot of people, a hell of a lot of fans. It was ambitious. It was pushing it.
Was it all going to fall flat on its face?
It was the band’s first night at the O2 Arena in London. Matt was nervous. He kept shaking his whole body, trying to warm himself up, to get himself psyched. The crowd sounded awfully quiet out there.
It was time. He and James, Tom and Harry, Danny and Dougie walked out to greet their audience.
There were only 400 people there.
The band plugged their guitars into the amps. Matt’s bass squealed with feedback. He plucked a note, just to get into it. The sound came only from the onstage amp. What?
The main PA system wasn’t switched on. Surely some mistake? He glanced, panicked, at their tech guy, but the chap was leaning against the sound desk with his arms crossed, shaking his head. There was no point in turning on the PA for only 400 people.
The guys launched into ‘What I Go to School For’. It sounded rubbish. Matt’s heart sank. He started sweating.
The 400 people came together at the front of the stage, waving their home-made banners forlornly in the vast, empty arena.
Matt swallowed hard. They were going to sink without a trace. McBusted were done for.
He gasped for breath. Is this what drowning feels like?
Matt Willis started awake, and sat up in bed, his heart racing and his body coated in sweat. Just a nightmare, he told himself. It was only a nightmare.
One that he hoped wouldn’t come true when tickets went on sale on Friday.
FIFTEEN
Step by Step
Sitting round a large breakfast table in London, six good friends gathered together to break bread. Usually, a meeting of mates like this would be punctuated with raucous laughter, ribald jokes and smiles as wide as the desert. But on this particular morning, with these particular six friends, their mouths were as dry as dust and there was more nervous tension than toast being handed round the table. An edgy quiet hovered over the group. McBusted were having breakfast – and they were waiting. Waiting, waiting, waiting for news.
All of them were nervous about the ticket sales. Had they been too cocky? Yet as James put it to Fearne Cotton – and to his bandmates that morning, ‘No going back now. We’re in this together.’
He later explained to Fearne the agony of waiting to see if the gigs had sold. ‘You really do dangle your balls out there,’ he said frankly.
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