Pigs Can Fly - Busted are back with a Sheffield Arena date

After selling over five million albums, winning two Brit Awards and performing in front of 7000,000 fans, the chart-topping pop pin-ups- James Bourne, Matt Willis and Charlie Simpson - broke millions of hearts when they split up.

Charlie quit to pursue a career fronting alternative rock band Fightstar and for almost a decade Busted appeared to be history.

Then Matt and James joined McFly to form supergroup McBusted for a tour and and a album two years ago.

And now the unthinkable. Charlie has reunited with his two band mates, they have written a new album - out in the autumn - and they have announced a 13 date Pigs Can Fly UK tour, including a date at Sheffield Arena on Tuesday, May 17.

It followed a successful secret writing session, which resulted in Busted recording their third studio album in Los Angeles.

Fans are hoping to get a preview of the first new songs since 2004 on the tour.

They will get all the hits - from album one and two, Busted (2002) and A Present for Everyone (2003) - including number one singles You Said No, Crashed The Wedding, Who's David and Thunderbirds Are Go/3AM.

Greatest hits from the Essex boys also include 2002 debut single What I Go to School For, Year 3000, Sleeping with the Light On, Air Hostess and She Wants to Be Me.

Their first show together in 12 years – and the first time in a dozen years anyone will have seen the three members play all their greatest hits together live – will be on Wednesday, May 11.

For the gig Busted will return to the home of their biggest triumph, the venue where anybody last saw them, at Wembley Arena, where they broke a record in 2004 by selling out an incredible 12 shows.

It’s the reunion they said could never happen - even the members themselves have admitted it.

Charlie said: "We're calling the tour 'Pigs Can Fly' because it just goes to show that anything can happen! None of us thought we'd ever tour together again, and it's been an amazing journey getting back to this point. We can't wait to get out on the road!

“A year ago James and I got together and just started hanging out … and it felt really different, somehow, to how it had ten years ago. And the idea crept into my head after all that time apart: what would Busted look like today?”

Matt said: “For me, there’s a huge sense of unfinished business … I always thought in my heart we’d do Busted again, but that it was just a matter of when and how."

James added: "We’ve done this crazy, exciting, adventurous, scenic route back to being Busted. And now we're here, we’re all super-re-energised”

Special guests on tour are Teenag Dirtbag hitmakers Wheatus and YouTube sensation Emma Blackery, who will join the band across UK and Ireland.


• Busted play Sheffield Arena on Tuesday, May 17.