Blue are preparing a 25th anniversary world tour and a new studio album while speaking openly about grief, mental health and the changed priorities that come with family life.
The group — Simon Webbe, Duncan James, Antony Costa and Lee Ryan — will release Reflections on Jan. 9 and begin a world tour in 2026. The band, whose 1990s and early 2000s hits provided soundtracks to school discos and magazine posters for many fans, has issued a new single, "One Last Time," which members say deals with bereavement and being there for loved ones in hard times.
The single is personal for James, who said he wrote it in memory of a friend, Terry John, a model, dancer and choreographer who toured with Blue on their first tour 25 years ago and who died last year. "We just became best mates and I lost him very tragically and sadly last year," James said, describing the song as "a bit of a love letter".
Members said they did not want the song to be solely mournful and chose to pair the lyrics with an uplifting beat. Webbe said the record can prompt strong emotions, noting that his wife was moved to tears when she heard it after the loss of a close relative.
The band described a different mindset from their earlier years on the pop circuit. All four members are fathers and said family responsibilities are a major reason they are touring again. Costa said they are touring partly because "we've got to work to provide for our families and put food on the table." James said the group now approaches their career with more discipline and a willingness to talk about difficult subjects.
"Mental health back then wasn't a thing," James said, adding that talking to others — whether therapists, colleagues or friends — had been a saving grace at different times in their careers. Webbe and the others said they rely on one another and have been more open about discussing struggles than in their early years when management and the music industry rarely provided dedicated emotional support.
Their former manager, Daniel Glatman, has written that if he were managing boybands now he would hire around-the-clock therapists, a comment members cited in reflecting on the difference in support available to artists now compared with the 1990s and 2000s. Costa said the band had experienced "graft, graft, graft" in earlier years and were not afforded the luxury of talking through pressures then.
Blue first rose to prominence with three number-one singles, three number-one albums and two Brit Awards before later struggling to match that chart success and being dropped by their record label. The band said they have watched a wave of nostalgia fuel comebacks across the music industry and that the current moment — with other acts returning to touring — has helped persuade them that now is the right time to mark a quarter-century together.
The members, who traded between emotional recollection and light-hearted banter in interviews, said they value the stability of a close working relationship. They intend to put the themes of responsibility, remembrance and resilience at the centre of their upcoming shows and recordings as they head back on the road.
Reflections will be released on Jan. 9 and Blue's world tour begins in 2026. The band said they aim to balance celebrating their past hits with new material that reflects the members' experiences of family life, loss and changing attitudes to mental health.
