When American rapper Nas cancelled his performance on Later… with Jools Holland at short notice, producers called touring Scottish singer-songwriter KT Tunstall with just 24 hours’ notice to perform in front of one of the nation’s biggest television audiences. Performing “Black Horse and the Cherry Tree” from her recently released debut album Eye to the Telescope, Tunstall struck a chord with viewers and her career quickly accelerated. The album eventually peaked at No. 3 on the British charts and was certified five-times platinum.

But nothing could prepare Tunstall for the stratospheric reach of “Suddenly I See” when it was used in the opening credits of The Devil Wears Prada, introducing her music to an entirely new audience as part of one of the most beloved films of the 2000s. Now, with the film celebrating its 20th anniversary with a sequel currently in cinemas, Tunstall is marking the same milestone by taking Eye to the Telescope on a global anniversary tour.

“It’s the most fun kind of unexpected ride so far in my career, where you have such a feeling of fulfilment when your first record does so well and it takes you all over the world,” says Tunstall. “The last thing you’re thinking about is what’s going to happen in 20 years’ time.”

For Tunstall, the anniversary is especially meaningful because she now sees the children of original listeners experiencing the album for themselves, with the music being passed down through generations.

“The most beautiful part of that particularly is that you certainly don’t think about people who are listening to that record bringing their kids up listening to that record. So, I now have 20-year-old human beings who’ve grown up with this album their whole life. It feels very magical.”

While 20^th anniversary tours have become increasingly common, Tunstall is not intending to reinvent the songs, instead focusing on delivering them to Australian audiences as they were originally intended.

“I’m not even going near reinvention. I haven’t played in Australia very often, so people haven’t had a chance to hear these songs as they are that often. The Aussie fans definitely just deserve to hear the songs as they should be played, which I’m really excited to do for everyone.”

There can often be a reluctance from artists to revisit the projects that launched them into the mainstream but Tunstall speaks about The Devil Wears Prada with genuine warmth. With the sequel now in cinemas, “Suddenly I See” has once again found itself back in the spotlight. While Tunstall has not yet seen the new film, she reflected fondly on the original’s enormous impact on her career.

“You don’t know that a film is going to go stratospheric. You don’t know that it’s going to be a modern cult classic within 10 years. I wrote the song about Patti Smith and it never occurred to me that this could be used for a girl getting a job at a fashion magazine.”

“It just changed my life. It completely took off. Japan is very into their fashion, and so as soon as that movie came out, they wanted me to come over to Japan and do a big Rolling Stone fashion shoot and tour over there.”

For Tunstall, the song itself became more famous than her own name, which is something she sees as a blessing rather than a frustration.

“It really was funny though as it didn’t exactly turn me into a household name, but it turned the song into a household [staple]. So it was a strange situation where I could pretty much get off a plane anywhere in the world and play that song and people knew the words, but they didn’t really know who I was. And it was perfect. I’m glad that that’s how it worked, that the song is way more famous than I am.”

“When you’re dreaming about being a rock and roll star or a pop singer, you dream about people singing the words. And even though you’re dreaming about it, it seems impossible. Once it’s happened and you’ve had it happen to you, you really appreciate how rare that is.”

In recent years, Tunstall has also moved into musical theatre writing, composing original music for Clueless: The Musical on the West End as well as The Singer, which will premiere at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival later this year. For Tunstall, writing for theatre offered the chance to step outside herself creatively and write from entirely different perspectives.

“When I’m writing for myself, that’s exactly what I’m doing. I’m the captain of the ship, I’m solo. It’s all about digging deep and being quite vulnerable and trying to be very honest with my own writing. And this is a very prescribed, collaborative form of entertainment as well as storytelling.”

“And it’s funny as a singer-songwriter because you spend so long trying not to care what other people think and writing what you think is good and it doesn’t matter if everybody likes it or not. Then musicals are the exact opposite of that, where you must write bangers that everyone is going to love. It’s quite easy to disappear up your arse as an artist writing poetic, vulnerable, meaningful music, but you’re also sharing and serving with that music. And it was a good reminder for me that it can be so fun to just write music that really gives people joy.”

While Tunstall revealed there are plans for Clueless to eventually come to Australia, she also hopes The Singer, which features two deaf and two hearing actors, weaving sign language into the storytelling, can travel internationally as well.

“I would love to see The Singer go to every country because it’s such a cool concept, having a musical that involves the deaf community and deaf actors and sign language. But the challenging thing is that sign language is different in different countries. So we would really have to tailor the show, which is a very fun idea to me. Tailor the show to make the characters Australian or make them American, you know? And change the music venue they play into a local venue where the show is playing.”

While Tunstall grew up loving movie musicals, it was contemporary stage works like The Book of Mormon, Come From Away and Six that ultimately inspired her to write for theatre herself.

“I could not believe that they were saying the things they were saying and people were not walking out of the theatre,” Tunstall says of The Book of Mormon.

“And the songs are genius. They’re just so funny, but they’re really great songs in terms of the writing as well. And I was like, ‘Oh, I could totally do this. This is fun.’ If people are willing to be challenged in that way comedically, then I’m in.”

With Tunstall currently touring Australia and her musical theatre work potentially heading here in the future, it is an ideal moment to see her perform live. As for why audiences should come along, Tunstall sums it up perfectly herself. 

“Because who doesn’t want to go back to 2004 and relive that amazing year of music?”

KT Tunstall tours Australia and NZ in May and June. For more information, click here.