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<\/p>\nJames Blunt really wanted to be a heavy metal star \u2013 but did not have enough friends to form a band.<\/p>\n
The singer, 49, whose 2005 hit You\u2019re Beautiful made the No 1 spot in 10 countries, claimed he would have loved to be like shock rocker Alice Cooper, 75. The dad-of-two \u2013 a former Army captain \u2013 also revealed that when he was younger he wanted "big hair" and to play screaming guitar solos \u2013 but in the end turned to soft rock.<\/p>\n
He said: "What I really wanted was to be a rock star. My goal was to be the guy playing Alice Cooper-style guitar solos with the big hair and a band. As it is, I have to pay those people to be in my band and to be my friends \u2013 and I stand with an acoustic guitar."<\/p>\n
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He added: "I didn\u2019t have enough friends to form a band, so I decided to become a solo artist." School\u2019s Out singer Alice is known as The Godfather of Shock Rock due to his blood-spattered shows which involve beheadings and gore.<\/p>\n
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It comes after James claimed in his autobiography, Loosed Based On A Made-Up Story, that he pours vodka on to the coals of his sauna to "imbibe" boozy steam. Other tales in his memoir include him spending thousands on liquid acid for his fig trees to grow \u201challucinogenic fruit\u201d.<\/p>\n
In the book, which he calls his "truth", he tells how he's spent thousands on a "mind-expanding" drug that was popular in the 60s and 70s to "water his fig trees" in an attempt to "grow hallucinogenic fruit". The singer, who has a fortune of around \u00a315 million, also describes his experience in the Army, where her served in Kosovo. He said he and his troop came under rocket fire and were told it would take 45 minutes for "air support" to arrive.<\/p>\n
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Rather than wait, he called his dad, Colonel Charles Blount, who was head of the Army Air Corps. He "called Daddy" and that "two Apache helicopter gunships arrived in less than five minutes," he told The Times magazine.<\/p>\n
Asked if the incident summed up "privilege", he said his comrades encouraged him to "make the call". He said: "My soldiers at the time would've called it the definition of 'useful'…they weren't bothered about me overexerting my privilege, they were saying, 'Yup – f***ing call him!'"<\/p>\n
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Other incidents relayed in the book include using the mouthpiece of his trumpet from his days in the Household Cavalry to puff out cocaine to revellers.<\/p>\n
Asked about why some folk didn't like him, he said: "To be honest, when I look back I want to punch me in the face. I came out of boarding school and the Army and I was very naive and I got a bit of a kicking. Did I deserve it? Yes, probably. Has it kept my feet on the ground? Definitely. And like boarding school, I've sort of come to enjoy it."<\/p>\n
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