He first rose to fame in Take That alongside Gary Barlow, Mark Owen, Jason Orange and Howard Donald and now, 25 years after breaking hearts across the world when he went solo, Robbie Williams is launching a brand new band.
The 46-year-old has joined forces with Australian songwriters and producers Flynn Francis and Tim Metcalfe for the group, and although they don’t yet have a name, the trio have been hard at work in the studio and already have songs to release.
Robbie broke the exciting news on Instagram Live, telling fans, “Little project that I’ve got going on with a couple of friends of mine, Flynn Francis and Tim Metcalfe. We’re forming a band everyone.
“I’ve got songs coming out that will not be under the name of Robbie Williams.”
The former X Factor judge has grand plans to tour the world with his new act, although it sounds like their musical output will be very much worlds apart from Take That’s chart-friendly pop tunes.
Robbie continued, “I’m gonna do this thing with my friends. Form a band and what I’m gonna do is rent a space, put my art in there. During the day it’ll be a gallery. Then at night I shall be DJing and it will be a musical venue, something the old folks will call a rave.
“I’ll be on the espressos. Oh yes I will. Quadruple espresso. Doing it old school. I’m very, very excited about this. I want to do it in Berlin. I also want to do it in Tokyo. I wanna do it in several places. Be fun won’t it?
“It’s one of them things, it’s a passion project. If something happens then great, if not, I’ve just had fun.”
CHECK OUT Take That through the years
Take That through the years stacked
1 of 251989
Starting with a line-up of five young men, Take That consisted of Gary Barlow, Howard Donald, Mark Owen, Jason Orange and Robbie Williams, with the original (short lived) name of Kick It.
2 of 251991
Take That's original line-up of Gary Barlow, Howard Donald, Mark Owen, Jason Orange and Robbie Williams. Thankfully they changed their name and after a few unsuccessful songs in the early 90s Take That's breakthrough hit 'It Only Takes A Minute' was released. The song was a cover of a 1975 song by Taveres and reached number 7 in the charts.
3 of 251992
In 1992 Take That had hits with 'A Million Love Songs' and 'Could It Be Magic'. The boys' follow-up single 'Could It Be Magic' quickly propelled them to super-stardom with a string of number 1s not far away.
4 of 251993
Take That had huge success in 1993 with 'Pray', 'Relight My Fire' (featuring Lulu) and 'Babe'.
5 of 251994
The band's success continued in 1994 with 'Everything Changes' and 'Sure'. Here they are performing at The BRITs 1994.
6 of 251995
However, in July 1995 after countless hits, fans heard the devastating news; Robbie Williams would be leaving the band following friction with other band members. Robbie later admitted in a TV documentary in 2005, that he did some "stupid stuff" after parting ways with the band over 20 years ago, but said he didn't regret it because he was young.
7 of 251995
The remaining members of Take That continued to perform as a quartet.
8 of 251996
Gary Barlow, Howard Donald, Mark Owen and Jason Orange performed at The BRITs in 1996. The remaining group of four continued to tour and release songs for another year, releasing 'Never Forget' and the Bee Gees cover 'How Deep Is Your Love', finally announcing they would be disbanding in February 1996. 'How Deep Is Your Love' became the band's final number 1 before they reformed 10 years later.
9 of 25Late 90's
During the late 90s three of the band members, Gary Barlow, Mark Owen and Robbie Williams, enjoyed solo singing careers with varying degrees of success. Jason Orange went into acting and Howard Donald, despite being the lead singer on a number of Take That songs, made a name for himself as a club DJ across Europe.
10 of 252005
Skip nearly a decade and ITV reunited the group for a documentary called Take That: For the Record in which the former members of the boyband were interviewed, discussing how they were discovered and looking back at their experiences in the band.
11 of 252005
Following the successful reception of the documentary by fans and the press, the decision was made to reunite with the 'post Robbie' line-up and a 2006 tour titled the 'The Ultimate Tour' was announced. After a break of nearly 10 years, Take That members Gary Barlow, Howard Donald, Mark Owen and Jason Orange reformed in 2005.
12 of 252006
Take That performed on The X Factor in 2006. In 2006 they had a Number 1 single with 'Patience'. Gone were the cheesy pop tunes of the 90s, Take That had grown up with their fans and the men, now in their 30s revealed a much more mature sound, with their 2006 comeback single 'Patience'. The song quickly hit the top spot in the UK and around Europe becoming the eighth best-selling single of 2006 spending a massive 11 weeks in the top 10.
13 of 252007
In 2007 Take That embarked on their 'Beautiful World' tour. Since their reunion as a four-piece, it was clear that they hadn't lost the momentum they had in the 90s with another string of hits including 'Shine', 'Rule the World' and 'Greatest Day'.
14 of 252009
After the release of fifth album 'The Circus' in December 2008, the boys headed out on their 'Take That Present: The Circus Live' tour to promote it - and what a spectacle it was! Tickets to the entire tour sold it in less than five hours, making it the fastest-selling tour in UK history.
15 of 252010
Robbie Williams made an unexpected return to the group in 2010, joining forces with Gary Barlow - the first time since 1995 - writing a song that would feature on both Take That and Robbie's albums. Then, later that year, the news that all Take That fans had been waiting for was confirmed, the original line-up would be reforming for the wildly successful album, 'Progress' and its live tour. Their lead single 'The Flood' was released and peaked at number 2 featuring both Gary and Robbie as lead vocals.
16 of 252011
Following the band's 'Progress Live' tour in 2011 they then decided to take a break.
17 of 252014
A couple of years later Take That reformed as a group to record their seventh studio album, but it was short-lived, in 2014 both Robbie and Jason decided to leave. Robbie had recently become a dad for the second time and saying he would find it difficult "logistically". The band continued as a trio made up of Gary Barlow, Howard Donald and Mark Owen.
18 of 252017
Take That returned earlier this year with their new album 'Wonderland' and their single 'Giants' which peaked at number 13. 'Giants' was written by the remaining three members of Take That along with some co-writers and the lyric video can be seen below.
19 of 252019
After celebrating Take That's 30th anniversary in 2019, the band put out a Greatest Hits album called 'Odyssey', which featured song "re-imagined with new arrangements and production". It debuted at Number 1, and the group embarked on a huge UK tour in 2019.
20 of 25May 2020
Take That reunited with former member Robbie Williams for a very special performance in May 2020 during the lockdown amid the global pandemic of Coronavirus, performing a 40-minute set.
21 of 25June 2020
The band's musical film Greatest Day was confirmed in June 2020! Although it had been in the pipeline for a couple of years, things started to get in motion in the summer, which is based on the jukebox musical The Band, containing Take That songs.
22 of 25November 2020
Gary released his fifth solo studio album on 27th November, 'Music Played By Humans', which debuted at Number 1 in the UK! It features singles 'Elita' featuring Michael Bublé and Sebastián Yatra, 'Incredible' and 'This Is My Time'. Other album tracks feature vocals from the likes of Beverley Knight, Alesha Dixon and James Corden among others.
23 of 252021
On 7th October 2021, Gary surprised fans with the announcement that he was launching his own wine company. He shared photos from his new company Gary Barlow Wines on his social media.
24 of 252021
In October 2021, Gary announced his first Christmas album 'The Dream Of Christmas' would come out on 26th November. The album includes new songs like 'How Christmas Is Supposed To Be' as well as Gary's take on some classic tunes. 'Sleigh Ride' and 'The Dream Of Christmas' were released on 28th October ahead of the album.
25 of 252022
In January 2022, Gary Barlow announced he would be putting on a theatre performance show called 'A Different Stage', with dates being added throughout the year.
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As well as working on his new band, Robbie revealed he had a mini Take That reunion during lockdown as he’s been writing songs with former bandmate Gary Barlow over Zoom.
The Rock DJ singer told fans he’s written over 50 songs in quarantine and even had a helping hand from his wife Ayda Field.
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This all comes after Robbie dropped the jaw-dropping candid confession that he had sex with his drug dealer just before meeting Ayda for the first time on their podcast (Staying) At Home With The Williamses.
“Can I also point out that the person you took drugs from, your dealer, you were also sleeping with. You had just f--ked your dealer, who had just dropped off drugs, before our first date? Romantic,” the actress revealed on the episode of the podcast, which aired earlier this year.
Robbie cheekily replied, “Yes. In people’s minds, dealers are usually men. [But she] wasn’t.”