James Blunt says Kanye West once called him for a collab: ‘I couldn’t take it seriously’
'I took his phone number but I never called him back because I just really fucked up!,' Blunt tells Rolling Stone UK of his brush with Kanye.
By Nick Reilly
James Blunt has revealed that Kanye West once phoned him up to ask if they could work together, but the singer’s “imposter syndrome” meant that the collaboration never happened.
Blunt, who is gearing up to release his sixth album Who We Used To Be later this month, recalled the unexpected phone call when asked by Rolling Stone UK if he has ever encountered any unlikely fans throughout his career.
“Kanye West once called me up and said he wanted to work with me. I couldn’t believe it,” Blunt recalled.
“I couldn’t take it seriously because it’s Kanye West! Why on earth is he calling me in the first place? It was a while back and I think he was a guy who was really interested in different musicians. He’d heard my music and wanted to collaborate.”
But the collab failed to happen after Blunt “fucked up” and forgot to ring the Grammy-winning rapper back, which he says is one of his “greatest regrets”.
“I took his phone number but I never called him back because I just really fucked up! It didn’t compute and it’s one of my greatest regrets,” he said.
“Of course I should have done. But I didn’t believe it, it’s just little me. Why would he really want to do that? It’s called imposter syndrome, really. You can’t take yourself seriously, so why would he?”
Blunt added: “I’ve had some really sweet comments from different people throughout my career. Paul McCartney said something really sweet early on and Elton John took me on tour around the world and he’s been incredibly supportive.”
For all the support from famous faces, however, Blunt admitted that it’s the support of his fans that remains the most mind-blowing thing to him.
“All of those things have taken me by surprise, but then again I’m about to start a European tour of arenas and these people turn up in their tens of thousands and that I find more incredible than one or two famous people saying they like your music. The fact that they’ve turned up to a show is absolutely mind-blowing for me and the fact that every time we put tickets on sale, I never expect them to sell. I always ring my manager and ask how we’re doing. He just responds ‘James, relax. The shows are selling out and they’re doing really, really well’. For me, that’s more impressive. The boys and girls in the public are the ones that surprise me more than famous people.”
James Blunt’s Who We Used To Be is out on October 27.