James Blunt says “house prices subsequently went up” after Noel Gallagher left Ibiza “because he couldn’t handle me writing my songs down the road from him”

nme.com:

James Blunt has spoken about why Noel Gallagher sold his house in Ibiza, joking that “house prices subsequently went up” after the Oasis musician left.The ‘You’re Beautiful’ singer-songwriter used to live close to Gallagher on the Spanish island.

However, it was reported in 2008 that the latter had put his £5.5million villa on the market.At the time, it was said that the High Flying Birds frontman was “fed up of hearing James Blunt bang on about Ibiza like he owns the place”.

A source added: “He can’t stand the thought of Blunt writing crap tunes up the road.”During an appearance on the latest episode of Elizabeth Day’s podcast How To Fail, Blunt discussed Gallagher being unable to tolerate his music. “I bumped into Noel Gallagher the other day,” he said.“He’d said he was leaving Ibiza and selling up his house because he couldn’t handle me writing my shit songs down the road from him, house prices subsequently went up after he left.”Blunt continued: “Whenever I see him, he’s really sweet to my face.

I think everyone’s sweet to each other’s faces. It’s just with the courage of a microphone and a journalist, and trying to show off a little, they’ll do something different.”The topic came up after Blunt once again spoke about Damon Albarn not wanting to be photographed with him for an episode of Later… With Jools Holland, and reflected other acts’ negative feelings towards him.“It was just really weird behaviour,” he told Day, adding: “There were a couple of other musicians who were saying things [about Blunt].“I guess those musicians probably found themselves falling into a kind of trap that music journalists set up for them.