On Saturday afternoon he attended the royal wedding at Windsor Castle, cheering on his mate Prince Harry as he tied the knot with the American actress Meghan Markle.
And immediately afterwards British singer James Blunt headed to Tallinn to perform before a capacity crowd at Alexela Concert Hall.
After the concert, the “You’re Beautiful” singer opened up to our partners at Publik DELFI.
Jaane Tomps, a leading Estonian culture journalist and Eurovision enthusiast, probed him about Israel’s recent Eurovision win and the possibility of him representing the United Kingdom.
The singer, whose debut album Back to Bedlam has sold over 11 million copies worldwide, says that Israel’s Netta Barzilai made a big impression on him with her song “Toy”.
“I thought it was great. I genuinely thought it was exciting and different and full of character and was so relieved it won.”
“I guess the thing I’m saddest about is that the UK just — it’s so bad — England never wins and I’m really just waiting for them to call me because I’m here to fix this.”
So when is the perfect time for him to take the reigns? “I think whenever the UK is ready to win Eurovision.”
James’ Saturday night admission comes as fans in the UK are petitioning for the BBC to internally select SuRie, who won countless new fans after battling past a stage invader to complete her Eurovision 2018 performance.
Although she finished 24th of 26 competitors, there is a growing belief that with a better song she could make an impact on the scoreboard.
A Change.org petition asks that the UK stage a national selection to choose SuRie’s song. The singer doesn’t seem opposed to it, as she recently RT’d a wiwibloggs video suggesting it’s a good idea.
What do you think about James Blunt’s Eurovision comments? Would you like to see him compete or at least write a song? Maybe he should write a song for SuRie? Let us know your thoughts in the comments box below.
Please God no!! First of all he said ‘England’ and his music is drab and awful!! Please just get a unknown or relatively unknown act with a brilliant song because James Blunt is awful and won’t help!
I’m so bored of people who have had some chart success saying they’ll enter Eurovision when the U.K. wants to win. It’s so arrogant of them. The audience is fickle, and if a James Blunt ballad was up against Toy and Fuego he’d not have won and then the press would all be about “EVEN JAMES BLUNT CAN’T WIN EUROPE HATES US”. If he wants to get involved he can write a song and work with a new performer to build us up to the top left. Then we can enter someone who is known to take us to the… Read more »
Please noooooooo… ‘you’re beautiful’ is the most irritating song of all times .
Has he done anything else ever since ?
Would be another low score for the UK
I don’t know about Eurovision, but people who say James Blunt has only one hit seem narrow minded to me.
Make that 46 points, give or take a few. Jury and televote points are now added separately.
I like his sense of humour, but songwise there may be better options (never say never, Cliff Richard ;).
Cliff Richard has already come in 1968 and 1973; apart from the nostalgia of seeing a former candidate again and for the respect due to the immense career he has built since then, I do not really see the value of his presence for the young people who are the ones who vote.
Everybody is saying that SuRie is talented and a great performer and the song is meh…
UK please focus on sending a better song! You have such a wide music industry. You dont necessarily need a famous singer to do well, you just need a beautiful song! Surie would be wondeful if you would send her again with a better song. Look at Italy. They dont have any neighbour support (maybe Albania and San Marino or Romania but thats not enough to do well) and yet televoting gave them the 3rd place. People dont hate on countries. The UK could do very well if only they wanted to.
I love, that artists with no big name but talent get a wonderful chance through Eurovision to become more known. And remember f.e. how exited we were when we had the chance to watch the first wiwibloggs interview with Eugent. If he was a know artist with hundreds of interviews at youtube – how boring would that have been instead. Imagine Eurovision with all the big money producers and the music money machines and already famous people occupy Eurovision. And what if one escpecially fomous artist comes … What do YOU think is good for Eurovision? SuRie represents the spirit… Read more »
Anyone else pished off that he refers to just England? As a Welshman, that’s really annoyed me.
Group hug to all my fellow Welsh, and the Scottish and Northern Ireland fans too.
James Blunt – Go look up what we Welsh call a carrot, then apply that to your name!
I hope he doesn’t represent us apart from Justin Bieber’s Baby, for me You’re Beautiful is the most annoying song ever !
It would be a great idea, James Blunt is a fabulous singer and songwriter (although I prefer his friend Ed Sheeran) and I’m sure he could come up with something great. However, if we look at even the list of the last twenty winners, none were already known at an international level before participating in the contest. We know something about it in France, not so long ago we had tested Patricia Kaas, Angunn (well, Angunn’s song was missed), Sébastien Tellier, and we didn’t do better than Top 10.
England?! Screw him. There is more to this island than England. Confirming his status as an insufferable tool.
I am more of him than Dua Lipa, Ed Sheeran, and the former One Direction, which has bad and boring mainstream songs.
Did you just compare ed sheeran to this one hit wonder?
James Blunt is not a one hit wonder. Both “You’re beautiful” and “1973” were #1 hits on the United World Chart, which is a combination of several charts across the globe.
It would be another Bonnie Tyler/Engelbert Humperdinck result for the UK I’m afraid (and yes, I do like all three).
So next year James Blunt and Robbie Williams should battle in the UK national final 😛
well the uk selection was always terrible so this could be a good change
nn sure, go back to your geological era
Oh dear, please no. We watch esc to escape from anoying mainstream music like yours.
I’m not sure he has what it takes to be a winner. His music is very understated which may not mesh well with Eurovision audience. But good for him for having that confidence.
Hvala, ne!
🙂 DINGDINGDINGDINGDINGDINGDINGDING!!! 🙂
JOWST has actually said he is interested in James blunt to perform his potential UK entry.
The real question is if James Blunt is interested in JOWST.
Anyway, Jowst said he wants to write a song for the UK in 2019, but I wouldn’t be very excited about that.
That’s a very mismatched combo really
SURIE NEEDS TO COME BACK! HAVE YOU HEARD HER OLD MUSIC??? ITS THE MOST BEAUTIFUL THINGS IVE EVER HEARD….WITH HER OLDER MUSIC SHE COULD WIN
I mean, with the right song, sure. Not gonna stop me from remembering the two torturous years in the mid-00s when You’re Beautiful was inescapable but it’s good PR. Select him and have a selection show for the song.
I would love to see SuRie with a grand song and staging.
No, don’t do it, Eurovision ruins careers 😀 no one can predict what’s going to do well, and even James Blunt can do really bad, heck not even Ed Sheeran would be save.
James Blunt career is over long time ago.
Ed Sheeran literally just really needs to show up to win. Eurovision could only dream of that
isn’t he too succesfull worldwide to be allowed to compete? i think the rulles of the eurovision only allow relatively unknown performers to compete…
I don’t recall seeing any such rule. The UK has sent established performers in the past decade (Blue, Bonnie Tyler, Englebert Humperdinck, although admittedly Englebert is too old-school even for Eurovision). I believe it’s really more up to how much the broadcaster is willing to spend for its entry, and I’m guessing tapping a more established performer would cost the broadcaster more money on top of entrance fees, staging, and the like, because the member broadcaster has to foot the bill for their entry, if I remember correctly. I’m assuming that’s including paying the performers as well. (Bonnie Tyler and… Read more »
Oh I see. I just never seen someone really big representing the uk, so I thought it’s because of some rule. And Bonnie Taylor and blue weren’t exactly in their pick when they participated. But I guess what you said makes sense. It’s odd though, cause it’s not like the UK doesn’t know how to produce great music
When it comes to bigger names (like with Australia’s entrants), the broadcaster usually has the support of a big record label to help foot the cost of things like promotion and staging. The problem in recent years is that the BBC alone has had to foot the bill for everything, even with acts like Molly and Joe and Jake who were both signed to major labels after being selected.
There is no such rule.
No thanks. If he was actually serious, he would submit an entry for You Decide wouldn’t he? But, of course, he won’t.
The UK would probably ditch the selection. Cyprus, Finland and Australia were supposed to hold national selections this year, but they abandoned the idea after big names got interested in the contest. I believe Croatia did the same.
Which would be an even worse idea because James Blunt has only had one ‘hit’ (I’m using that term very loosely here) song in the last decade. What’s the likelihood of the song being a strong enough entry for the contest?
My original point, however, was more that if he doesn’t even feel confident enough that he can win over the home crowd, how can he turn around and say he’d be able to win Eurovision?
James Blunt & SuRie. Eurovision 2019?
Really? Blunt is a one-hit wonder, well past his career peak…
OMG! UK JUST HIRE HIM! These are big news for the UK, I hope they take advance of it. I absolutely love James Blunt.
He would slay the jury voting. It’s sad that BBC is not capable of handling a big project like Eurovision, a massive TV show with big potential. It’s the show that brought decent ratings to BBC in primetime beating Britain’s Got Talent! Imagine if they had a big name representing the country with a song that was a hit before the final. Why can’t the UK OGAE fan club put pressure on BBC and its Eurovision team to actually have chats with Robbie Williams and Blunt for a potential Eurovision entry?? Why they don’t want to win or do well?
Eleni Foureira just signed a contract with Sony Music for potentially a worldwide release of her music. Great that her and Mikolas are getting the recognition they deserve, they’re the real winners of ESC2018 even if the leaderboard says otherwise. Everyone else will fade into obscurity. Great work.
No need to throw shade at other contestants tho
But it’s the truth, even though we’ve come to love (me personally) other artists, most of them Eurovision was their peak. Mikolas has so much more to look forward to, done deal even before Eurovision and now Eleni that’s worked extremely hard to get where she got. Can’t wait to see what new music they release!
You sound pressed and deluded. Emmelie de Forest signed a bigger contract and she disappeared within a month.
OMG! I love James Blunt! But BBC needs to be serious! They shouldn’t waste him. If they want to invest in Eurovision, take it seriously and go far from bottom places, then yes. Let him compose his own song and send him.
Wait, what???? Send him NOW! lol.
I think James might be too famous for the contest. I could see him do a similar song like Michael Schulte with a guitar on stage. It‘s not the time for him yet I think. He can still get hits after all.
I‘d rather go with other choices. Whom which aren‘t too famous but bring a lot of experience with them such as Amy Macdonald, Ella Henderson, Birdy or male artists like Plan B, Will Young or Paolo Nutini. They all had cute hits across Europe but could need that certain boost that is Eurovision.
By sending a big name, the UK could change their perspective about the contest, and perhaps improving the songwriting camp. I mean… a big name with a good song too, not something like Bonnie Tyler, and even Jessica Mauboy, did.
“too famous”? Says who? You seem to be saying that the contest is only for lesser-known acts who’ve stopped getting hits. Exactly the sort of attitude which is holding back the UK.
Sorry, but I think the UK has only sent local acts since the last few years (SuRie, Lucie Jones, Joe & Jake, Electro Velvet and Molly) only the British know about. Bonnie Tyler was the exception but also still too famous in my opinion even after her peak. I mean she was massive after all, had world hits. They did it right with Blue who disbanded, reformed after some years have gone by and earned the best position (#11) for the UK in this decade. That‘s why I see similar acts, who got famous for 15 minutes and then sorta… Read more »
Then again, Patricia Kaas
I disagree. I think this is a perfect time for an artist like James Blunt. Arguably his career has already peaked but he is by no means forgotten in the UK, and more importantly, across Europe. IMO the BBC does want to win they are just absolutely clueless about what they need to do to achieve it. Will be really interesting if this might pan out.
I’m sorry to say, whether we remember him or not might be irrelevant. I for one have never rewarded someone with a vote just because I know who they are. I doubt I’m in the minority in this.
But if he has a good song and a good performance, he could do really well. Just not on his fame alone.
I know just one song from him, from way back when, and I think pretty much everyone can guess what that is.
This would be my mom’s biggest dream come true.