To commemorate the 20th anniversary of his debut album ‘Back To Bedlam’, double BRIT Award winner James Blunt announces plans to release a special remastered version of the much loved record.
Scheduled to drop Friday, October 11th 2024 – exactly 20 years to the day of its initial release – the special edition comes a with version of the original album remastered for 2024 by Stuart Hawkes at Metropolis, in addition to previously unreleased demos of the core songs from the album, plus previously unreleased songs from the ‘Back To Bedlam’ era.
Formats include a single red recycled colour vinyl, 2 CD, 6 panel soft-pak with 16 page booklet, and available digitally.
Speaking of the records re-release Blunt says: “I’ve released seven studio albums, but ‘Back To Bedlam’ was the one people actually bought. So on its twentieth anniversary, the record label and I thought we should repackage it with some early demos, and milk it for all it’s worth. It was one of the biggest selling albums of the 00’s, so here’s hoping it makes a dent in the 20’s.”
To celebrate this milestone in his recording career, James will also take to the road in February of next year to embark upon a special run of UK arena dates as part of the Back To Bedlam 20th Anniversary Tour.
Scheduled to kick off in Belfast at the SSE Arena on February 11th 2025, the tour will see the ‘Wiseman’ singer play further dates in Leeds, Glasgow, and Manchester, before wrapping up proceedings with an extra special show at The O2 Arena in London on February 16th 2025.
From there James will head over to Europe to play a number of gigs in Paris, Bologna and Zürich.
Tickets for all dates are on-sale now.
“I’ve been touring now for twenty years, and really, it’s only ‘Back To Bedlam’ that people want to hear… so on that album’s twentieth anniversary, what better way to celebrate than to head out on the ‘Back To Bedlam 20th Anniversary Tour!” explains James. “I’ll play all the songs from the album in full, from start to finish, and chuck in the better known songs from later albums to finish. It’s going to be, well, it pains me to say it… beautiful.”
‘Back To Bedlam’ featured the global smash hit ‘You’re Beautiful’ and is one of the top ten best-selling albums of the Noughties. In 2006, James won two Brit Awards, two Ivor Novello Awards and has received five Grammy nominations following the projects international success.
The 20th anniversary edition of ‘Back To Bedlam’ is available to pre-order here.