BLUE will be bringing ‘all the hits’ when they perform in Poole later this year.

That’s what band member and ‘Dorset boy’ Duncan James promised when he spoke with the Daily Echo about the upcoming gig.

The noughties pop band is bringing its greatest hits tour to Poole Lighthouse on Sunday, September 29.

“We’ll be flying in from Singapore and land that morning. We’ll be fresh off the plane, giving the audience all the hits. All the latest songs, all the old songs.” Duncan said.

And the trip to Poole will be extra special for Duncan, who has fond memories of the town from his childhood.

He said: “I’m really excited to get down to Poole. I used to go Poole Harbour a lot with my mum when I was a little boy.

“My best friend at the time lived in Poole with his mum, and my mum and his mum were best mates, so we used to go and get our cockles and whelks from a little store next to Poole Pottery.”

Despite now living in Surrey, Duncan remains the ‘Dorset boy’ of Blue to local fans, having spent the first 12 years of his life in the county. He explained: “I was one of those kids that moved around so much - I was never really in one place for long.

“I lived in Blandford for several years, then I lived in Bournemouth, and Wimborne.

“Then I moved to Devon, but I was in Dorset from when I was born till about 12.”

BlueBlue (Image: Ali Parry Management and PR)

While Duncan has a busy life on tour, he appreciates the chances he gets to return to Dorset.

He told the Daily Echo: “It’s always nice coming back.

“I like being back by the sea. It gives me a happy vibe and it makes me remember a time in my life, where I was, I guess, carefree, and didn’t have any worries. When you’re a child, you don’t have any worries really, do you?

“The sea always reminds me of being a child, being young and going to Branksome Chine every summer with my grandparents.

“They owned a beach hut there, and we used to go there the first two weeks of August, every single year. I used to have the best time just sitting on the beach just building sandcastles.”

So, how will Duncan and the rest of Blue be preparing for their performance in Poole? With some quirky rituals and manuka honey apparently.

“We have a few little things we do [to prepare], we’ve got quite a few OCDs in Blue.” Duncan said.

“There’s certain things we do before every show, where we have to huddle in a little circle and we have to look at our feet, we have to ground ourselves and say, ‘where are we?', because we’re always travelling and there’s nothing worse than going on stage and going ‘hello Southampton’ when you’re in Bournemouth.

“So we’ll say where we are and the name of the venue, and then we put our hands on top of each other, and we go ‘1 2 3 4 Blue’.

“We do that every single show without fail before we go on stage, that’s like a ritual.

“And warming up, we always ask for straws. We do our warmup by putting straws into our mouth and kind of humming into the straw. It really helps open up your vocal chords.

“On our rider we have manuka honey, ginger, lemon and fresh mint, and straws - that’s about as rock and roll as we get these days.

“We don’t have alcohol any more on the rider, that’s gone out the window.”

For tickets to Blue’s show in Poole, visit the Lighthouse website.