Busted reunited

British pop punk band Busted announced a reunion tour on Tuesday, nearly 11 years after Charlie Simpson left the group and forced it to break up.

The trio, made up of Simpson, James Bourne and Matt Willis, said they would also make new music for the first time since 2004.

The band, known for hits like “Year 3000” and “You Said No”, won two Brit Awards and sold more than 5 million records at the height of its success.

Simpson left to perform in a rock band and was later quoted as saying his time in Busted was “like torture”.

Willis and Bourne went on to join forces with fellow boyband McFly in 2013 to form McBusted, but the trio said things changed when they recently went to a recording studio in Philadelphia.

“This has been sort of building for the last couple of years now, with us getting back, rebuilding our friendship,” Simpson told Reuters in a joint interview with Willis and Bourne.

“We went for a long time without really seeing each other so … the culmination of all that happening today was pretty wild.”

Busted kick off a 13-date UK arena tour next May.