What were your favorite moments on your tour so far?
I’ve played three times now at the most amazing festival in the world called Glastonbury, and twice I’ve been lucky enough to play on the main stage. For me, I can’t describe the feeling, really, looking out at something like 80,000 people in the English countryside. It was amazing.

What country impressed you the most and how?
I played in Beirut which was really an amazing place. It’s a fantastic mixture of Arab and European really—of Muslim, Christian, and Jew, and French influences. The scars of war, the amazing old buildings, people’s passion was all amazing.

In “If Time Is All I have,” are you singing to someone in particular?
Yes, really. All my songs are about real life and real experiences and real people, and I don’t name them in songs because I don’t think they necessarily would want to be named but yeah, I write about real experiences, which is why I hope an audience can then relate them to their own lives, because we all feel similar things.

Who’s your dream collaborator?
You know, I’m quite selfish in the way that I write songs normally for myself and about my own experiences in life. It’s my way of understanding the world, but you know if I were to have a band, it would be fun to have Jimi Hendrix in it. In “Stay The Night” I had a collaboration. It was Ryan Tedder from One Republic and my producer Steve Robson but we also wrote with Bob Marley which is pretty cool because we thought he was dead!

Among your songs, which one is your personal favorite and why?
There’s one called “Superstar” which is so much fun to play; it’s the song I’ve always wanted to write; it’s the song of a teenager who feels frustrated that every time he turns on the TV, there are talent shows telling him that he should try and be rich and famous, magazines telling him what music he should like or clothes to wear, and he says, You know what? I don’t want to follow this path, I want to be myself. Interview by Vasachol Quadri and Sasinipa Wasantapruek

James Blunt will be performing on Aug 9, at IMPACT Arena. Tickets cost B1,000-4,000 from Thaiticketmajor.com.