James Blunt on the Meaning Behind “Monsters” and Iam Tongi’s Cover

As the son of a former Army colonel and helicopter pilot, James Blunt admits that it’s easy to presume he and his father had a distant relationship. But his song “Monsters” proves that it was anything but. “When the world went mad for me and music…my father and my mother were there to catch me when I failed, when I needed help,” Blunt recalls to American Songwriter. 

Originally released in 2019 off Blunt’s album, Once Upon a Mind, “Monsters” is an achingly beautiful ballad Blunt wrote in the wake of his father’s kidney disease diagnosis.

“Monsters” was popularized when American Idol winner Iam Tongi used it as his audition song, quickly capturing the hearts of millions. In this Q&A with American Songwriter, Blunt opens up about the meaning of “Monsters” and how he feels about Tongi’s interpretation. 

American Songwriter (AS): Tell me about the inspiration behind “Monsters.” 

James Blunt (JB): My dad was unwell with stage four chronic kidney disease, which is incurable, and needed a transplant. At that stage, you start to see a timeframe where if he doesn’t get a new kidney, he might not be with us anymore, and that came as a huge shock to me. He’s my hero in life, and it’s one of those times where as a musician, what else are you going to do but write a song? When something moving happens of genuine meaning, that’s when probably the most authentic songs come out because you just write the message to the person that you’re writing for. 

[We] wrote this incredibly raw song when I realized that potentially my father could die soon. I’m a married man now, I have children, and when you have children, you start to see the whole circle of life. My dad’s time coming to an end but being there for the gap that he might leave filled with children. In many ways, the song, the lyric, it speaks as if I was speaking the words that I might have said to my children as well. When my children talk about the monsters, that’s [what] I sing to my father. It’s my turn to chase the monsters away like he would have done once with me.

AS: Talk about the emotion you poured into this song and why you were able to do that through music.

JB: From my background, we’re not people who discuss emotion very well. I suppose that’s maybe why I got into music in the first place, it’s the medium with which I use to express myself. When you can say things to or about someone about how you feel, and then you can take it to them. I suppose sometimes it’s easier to write someone a letter, isn’t it? And maybe music’s the same kind of thing. It’s at a distance, you can get it right and you can let the words percolate a bit and really capture how it is you feel before you present it to them. 

I suppose the tough thing after that is then playing it out in public or to the person you’ve written about. So I had to then say to my father, “Can you come upstairs, please, I need you to hear a song.” And that was a pretty moving moment. He was sweet about it. He got a transplant, and he’s still alive and well. He said, “I’m really sorry I’m still alive, James. If I died, it would have made a much bigger hit. The profit margins would have been up.” [laughs] So he’s pretty cool in that way.

[RELATED: ‘American Idol’ Winner Iam Tongi, James Blunt Deliver Tearful “Monsters” Duet]

AS: Take me inside the writing room that day and the emotions you were feeling and where these lyrics came from.

JB: I find that in the studio, I go in and I mess around with music and really try and find a bit of melody that is interesting. Although that’s the way I normally write songs, I never find my best songs that come that way. My best songs come with a lyric that is tied into a melody straightaway. My biggest songs are “[You’re] Beautiful,” and I was in a bath at the time and I sang the words, you’re beautiful, because that’s the way I’d sing it with that melody about a specific person that I’ve seen. With “Monsters,” I have the lyric already, I’m not your son/You’re not my father/We’re just two grown men saying goodbye/No need to forgive/No need to forget/I know your mistakes and you know mine, because that’s our story. I’m an adult now and I want him to understand that I respect him hugely, but to say I see [us] at that moment as equals looking in each other’s eyes as my friend as much as my father. Those ones are really really raw. You can always worry if someone might misinterpret what I’m saying – what I’m saying is, “I’m your friend.” 

Breathe a last word/You can feel my hand on your own – those moments are desperately raw as well. You can see that that’s me whereas before, it’s a conversation. That section of the song is where I’m breaking. You can really feel that that’s me at that moment emotionally breaking. That was the bit I sang on American Idol with Iam Tongi and he broke down in tears, thinking about his own father. You suddenly realize the desperation of that moment, because, for him, his father had died and [was] really living that. And the poignancy in the next line, I will be the last one/So I’ll leave a light on/Let there be no darkness in your heart. It’s a real moment where you can imagine the death of your closest relative. It’s a really amazing moment to live it in many ways. But I think Iam and I really lived it on a stage together.

AS: Did you know ahead of time that Tongi was going to use that for his audition song?

JB: I had no idea. It was on my birthday and I was having a party at home. Suddenly, I started being sent messages saying that my song’s at number one on the American iTunes chart, and I thought, “That’s a sweet birthday present.” Then I heard his performance, and it’s just a beautiful performance. His voice is just amazing. The emotion with which he sang is deeply moving, and you can’t help but be touched. I was like everyone else when I watched him do it, I became a fan.

He does it in a really different way from me. Mine’s a really miserable version, like a funeral march, whereas his is slightly lighter, a lightness of spirit. I suppose it’s more accessible in that way, it’s not just all doom’s gloom. There’s a bittersweet way and a beauty with which he performs it, and in some ways, a sweetness and a warmth that is kind of integral to the way he would like to pass that message to his father, too. I watched and listened to it and definitely for a moment thought, “Wow, maybe I should have done it that way.” [laughs]

AS: How did the opportunity to perform it with him on Idol come about and how did you approach the song together?

JB: We joked on the night when I heard his performance, “It’d be amazing if he asked me to come over and perform it with him.” And then, sure enough, he got to the finals and did. I think he’s a really lovely human being and his voice is from heaven and singing with him was a real treat. 

We changed the key, we worked out which bits worked for each other, and some harmonies along the way. Otherwise, it’s just instilling each other with confidence.  That’s all it is about being on stage is to not think about the audience so much, but to think about where the song comes from. I suppose you can see, we both did that in the performance and reassured each other, and then get into it. I’m singing to my father, but my father is still alive, so I can give that message and sing it to him, whereas Iam broke down in the song because his father is not there, and that’s what touched him the most.

You can see us both giving that moment our all, but it was lovely to share it with him. It was an incredibly moving performance for me. I walked offstage and asked, “Iam, was that okay?” because I over emote so much. I’m so deep in a song. And then Iam’s obviously so deep in the song too and you don’t know if we’ve overcooked it. But I think people really felt the integrity of the performance and how much we were involved in it.

I felt my job was to sing with Iam and to stand by his side and sing it with him, and to try and enjoy the performance and get into the performance as much as we possibly can. For the ups and downs of the emotion, I felt we were very close to each other during all of that. It was two guys in sync, going through different times in our lives, but totally in sync with the emotion.

AS: What does “Monsters” mean to you now?

JB: I will always be known for my biggest hit, “You’re Beautiful.” I’ve got another one which hit in the States called “Goodbye, My Lover.” But something like “Monsters” for me is a deeper song than my biggest hit and it’s a song which I’m really proud of. I know I have a couple of really special songs like that which you hold on to. But the biggest, most emotional moments of a concert will be a song like “Monsters,” and I have a couple of other ones which people are really turning up for.

Photo by: ABC/Eric McCandless