The Busted boys are also Tories. Hold your breath.. just as the Spice Girls once pledged their support to the conservatives, Busted could very well be Michael Howard's secret weapon in the next election. When the conversation turns to politics, Matt claims to have once voted Lib Dem (presumably in a by-election, he's only 21); James pledges his vote to the Monster Raving Loony Party. And Charlie? How will he be voting? 'Tory', he says flatly.
'Yeah, he's a Tory boy!' Screams Matt, in a pejorative manner.
'I don't really like talking about politics but I've always grown up with their views- the Tories' way of doing things. I just prefer it,' says Charlie.
'Yeah acually, you know what, I am nnot going to bbe ripped off any more,' chimes in Matt, 'From the financial position I am in now, I am a f***ing Tory boy too.' James nods in agreemant.
The other day, says Matt, Busted were playing an outdoor gig when he looked into the crowd and saw a young girl holding up a banner that read: 'Who needs porn when you've got James Bourne?' The band are pretty much used to these things by now, he explains. In gigs they've had girls waving flags that say 'Psycho girls go all the way' and, more directly, 'Let me blow you, Mattie'. Bare-breast flashing is becoming a perk of the job. 'But the most outragous one of all,' says Matt gleefully, 'was one that read: 'My fingers are all rusted from frigging over Mattie from Busted'.' 'Did you invite her backstage after the gig?' I ask. 'No, man. She was only about 14,' Matt says, laughing like a goon. 'And I swear she was with her mum too.'

Charlie, perhaps, is the least comfortable. 'A girl sent me some of her pubic hair,' he says, sounding mortified. 'In an envelope.'
'We like to be in control of everything,' says Matt earnestly. 'We're even in control of our merchandise. Like the other day we were talking about whether to do pyjamas and pillow cases with our printed images on them. We were like, 'OK, we'll do the pyjamas.. but not the pilow cases.''
James and Matt, who play guitar and bass respectivly, first met Charlie when he replied to an ad they'd placed in NME. 'He had a guitar slung over his back,' recalls James.
'I thought he was Dutch,' counters Matt. 'I saw this spiky hair, these big eyebrows and massive bellbottom trousers- I thought he must be Dutch!'
'Dutch?' says Charlie incredulously. when he hears this. ' Fucking DUTCH???!!!'
'We'd never met anyone who spoke like that,' says Matt. 'I mean, he sounded like the Prince of Wales.' Did you think he was too posh to rock? 'What are you talking about?' pipes up James. 'Mick Jagger's posh, isn't he? There are a lot of posh people in rock'n'roll these days: Chris Martin, Radiohead, the blokes from Keane. The fact that he was posh was the last thing on our minds. He could sing, he could play, and he looked great. He was in.'
Despite what you may have read in your daughter's copy of SHOUT or MIZZ, everyone in the band admits to having a girlfriend. Matt dates Holly (a record-company girl, who in a neat take of Busted's obsession with older women, is 30 years old). James dates Kara and Charlie is seriously dating a girl he calls Camylou, whose name is really Camilla. As you can imagine, the band has got quite some mileage out of the whole 'Charles and Camilla' thing. 'What is so funny is that Charlie mumbles like Charles too,' says Matt. 'Sometimes you cant understand a word he's saying.'
Matt says: 'You can as soon as the fans walk into the room which one of us they're gonna go for. The really rough, Cockney, mouthy types all tend to like me, and James always seems to attract the mums. The lovely looking, clean-cut, well-spoken girls go for Charlie.'
'The press go on about thhe posh thing too much,' says Charlie in the kind of commanding voice that could man the phones at quintessentially.com if the Busted hits dried up. 'It pisses me off.'
'Yeah, but Charlie can do a good Cockney impression, can't you Charlie? Go on - say, 'yew fackin twat',' orders Matt. 'Yewwwww FACKIN twaaattt!!!!!!!' says Charlie, obediently. 'You facckkinn wankkaaaaa!!!' Then he looks a bit embarrassed.
I say, 'I thought Charlie was the posh one?' 'Well,' James says, 'yeah. My fees were local numbers; his were international calls. But my school only had 6 pupils in each class.' 'Six? Really?' says Charlie, obviously impressed.

America beckons (Busted play their US dates later this year). And there have been reports of toasters and televisions being slung out of hotel windows during high jinks on the summer tour. Matt and James have been violently sick on occasions from rampant overindulgence in several seaside towns. Rolling Stone Ron Wood has, apparently, admitted that he is a fan and that he wants to work with the boys sometime in the future. OK, so he's not 'posh' Mick Jagger, but it's a start.