And we’re still right here, after all these years” – ‘Look What You Started’

Song sung Blue: the boyband who were boy fans’ not-so-guilty secret are back. And, as proved by the tracks already trailed from their upcoming seventh album, they’re as ambitious, adventurous and up-for-it as they were when they started out 25 years ago, when Blue were the edgier, more street-real counterparts to their polished, put-together (in both senses) rivals.

With Reflections, Antony Costa, Duncan James, Lee Ryan and Simon Webbe are doing just that: reflecting on their shared history, their partnership, their friendship. On their passion for their band that means all four original members are still standing strong. On a quarter-century career that encompasses three consecutive UK #1 albums (All Rise, One Love, Guilty); 11 Top 10 singles including the #1 smashes ‘Too Close’, ‘If You Came Back’ and ‘Sorry Seems To Be The Hardest Word’ (with Elton John); enduring Noughties pop classics ‘One Love’ and ‘All Rise’; and two BRIT Awards (British Breakthrough Act 2002 and British Pop Act 2003).

“Twenty-five years down the line, a lot has happened,” begins Costa with some understatement. “We’ve all had kids, we’ve all got family, we’ve all lost loved ones. We’ve all gone through experiences, as a band and individually. And for me as a songwriter, I’ve enjoyed writing songs for this album so much more than any before – because we have been through that life stuff.”

In the same way that the excitement around Blue’s upcoming tour dates in Asia, Europe and the UK (expanded to meet explosive ticket demand) speak to multi-generational enthusiasm around their return, so Reflections embodies a sense of a band leaning into all the lessons – emotional, musical and (oh yes) sexual – learned in their near-three-decade career.

So that “life stuff” is manifested in 13 glorious songs, all written by the band, that crystalise their communal triumphs and personal passions, their mutual journey and individual challenges. It’s there in new single ‘Waste My Love’, which they describe as “an R&B track reflecting the golden era of 2000s soul — nostalgic yet refreshed with today’s production and emotion”.

And it’s there in ‘One Last Time’, the rock-leaning, curtain-raising first single that powerfully honours a close friend whom James lost last year.

“I met Terry on the first Blue tour,” he says. “He was a dancer. I had no idea he was gay, and he had no idea I was gay, because at that time we were both completely closeted.” They reconnected a few years later when both moved to the same corner of London. “And we became best mates because we came out to each other. He became a real confidante. So when he died, I was absolutely devastated. Then I was driving home one day and I had this melody in my head, and the lyric ‘one last time’. I got my phone out, recorded it in voice memos and that was the start of the song.”

The sense of lives fully lived is also there in ‘Where I Come From’. It’s a deep cut from Ryan in which the typically scorchingly honest lyric sees him reflecting on his time “when I was doing loads of shit TVs, things that were very pop culture but weren’t where I ever wanted to be as an artist”. And it’s there in ‘The Day the Earth Stood Still’, the Costa composition that, for its writer, unblocked a difficult truth he’s not afraid to acknowledge.

“At first, I didn’t want to do another album – I was adamant,” Costa says, thinking back to the busy run of concerts following the release of 2022’s Heart & Soul. “I just wanted to gig, enjoy myself and not have the stress of trying to write songs and making the cut on the album. Then one day I was driving and ‘The Flood’ by Take That came on the radio. It was a lightbulb moment. I thought: this is such a good track for a boy band that’s been around, on and off, now, 30-odd years. I wanted to do something in that style.”

Working with regular band collaborator Paul Visser, he set to writing. Then, when he played the demo to “the boys, they loved it. From that it snowballed, and kickstarted the whole album process. And this from the guy who didn’t want to do an album!” Costa laughs. “With that song – a grown-up song that was in your face – I felt reborn.”

 Webbe, though, readily admits that Costa’s album-unlocking track presented a problem: it was too good.

“After Ant brought in ‘Earth…’, I was like: I don’t think I’m gonna get any songs on this album!” he cheerfully admits. “Because the bar was already set so high.” Then he realised that this moment in Blue’s history presented an opportunity. “Because it is the 25th anniversary, it’s a big moment – we’ve got to reflect on a quarter-century. So it can’t all be musically one direction.” Or, even, One Direction. “Which we never have done, in fairness. I went back through the All Rise album, and listened to all the genres we explored, albeit with that R&B sound at the heart of the singles.”

That spirit of exploration and celebration finds vivid form in ‘Souls of the Underground’, Blue’s appropriately soulful tribute to both the godfathers of the genre and to their own mighty back catalogue. Their very modern adventurism is further incarnated in ‘Neon Honey’, James’ sexed-up take on Harry Styles’ ‘Watermelon Sugar’. “There’s lot of innuendo in that song,” he says, grinning. “Lines like: ‘I don’t want a slice, I want the whole cake.’ You get the picture! But as boybands go, we’ve always been a bit edgier. If any band can get away with it, Blue can.”

The romance is more PG-friendly in the pop-R&B of Webbe’s sweetly nostalgic and sublimely singalong ‘You Should Know’.

“It’s a representation of our younger selves,” he explains. “It was about that time when you were kids and you had a boyfriend or girlfriend for the summer holidays. So that’s the lyric: ‘It was always over before it started, and I left you alone with the broken-hearted, you should know I’m sorry.’ ’Cause I was only young then!”

It's also a brilliant showcase for all four members’ individual vocal skills – as is album opener ‘The Vow’, a sweeping, symphonic overture on which, as Webbe says, their voices “mesh like brothers”. The result is a collective magic born of its collective origins.

“The journey of that one is, we were on tour with Olly Murs,” says co-writer Costa. “I used to find it cringeworthy when artists say, ‘yeah, man, we wrote most of the album on the road, on the bus’ – it’s so eggy! My toes start toe-curling. But: this one was honestly written on the bus, on a Sunday morning, driving to Newcastle for the gig!”

 “I gave my strings guys in Sweden the idea of the Manics, Verve, early Robbie,” says Ryan, “big, massive epic strings. So that song had its own journey, trust me!” he exclaims. “And I wrote it about my wife, so it’s even more special the fact that it opens the album.”

...where what's to come is about expecting the unexpected. Step forward 'Beautiful Spiritual', a funky, dancefloor-friendly work-out worthy of George Michael. “That song, I promise you, is 21 years old," says Ryan. "I wrote that song after I did my solo album. After that, I banged out a whole other album in three weeks with alternative, crazy lyrics, experimenting with my voice… Beautiful Spiritual was one of them songs, but with new verses I wrote at Duncan's urging.”

‘Look What You Started’ is another Ryan composition, starting life during Covid when he’d just moved to Spain. “I set up a little studio in this apartment me and my wife got opposite the sea. I got back to what I loved: sitting with my guitar, sitting at the piano, coming up with songs. And because the world was so still, I could focus solely on the music.”

Five years on, it’s brought to life in a synth-led, electronic-soul style, its inclusion on the album the result of the vigorous artistic debate the four mates had as they fought to make Reflections the best record it could possibly be. As Ryan frames it: “We argued over this album. It certainly wasn’t plain sailing. But Blue is a democracy, and that comes with politics, and with that comes frustration. We’ve never fallen out, though, and we wouldn’t ever, because we have too much respect for each other.”

But when it comes to the art of what they do, Ant, Dunc, Lee and Si will push each other. Because they’re passionate. Because they care. Because it works, as proven by Reflections – the bold, buoyant encapsulation of a stellar career and a stellar, still steel-strong connection. An album for right now that honours, and builds upon, their legacy.

Or, as Webbe puts it: “We’re all artists, we’re all brothers, we’re all Blue.”

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