Robbie Williams made an appearance at a press conference in Croke Park yesterday evening, following the announcement of a massive headline show at the venue on August 23, 2025.

The former Take That man's Live 2025 tour kicks off in Edinburgh on May 31 next year, with gigs lined up across the UK and Europe. The Dublin date marks will be is first in three years, since he took the stage at the 3Arena during his XXV tour in 2022.

"I grew up in England, but I have always felt Irish," Williams told reporters. "In a way, it's like coming home. There is something special about the audience here. There is a heart that beats
and an energy that isn't created [elsewhere]. There is a love and a passion and a wildness that's intoxicating.

"I'm 50 now, but I feel like a brand new artist. I feel as though I'm receiving everything in the way that I should have done back in the day, when I just didn't because I couldn't for whatever reason. I feel very grateful and I'm buzzing to be back here."

The superstar made headlines and raised a few eyebrows earlier this year when it was revealed that an upcoming biopic Better Man, directed by The Greatest Showman's Michael Gracey, would see Williams depicted as a CGI monkey.

"I realised that this might be a divisive idea," he explained. "But it wouldn't be me if I didn't take a big, awkward swing at something and try to do something unusual. The most amazing thing about the idea in itself is the unbelievable amount of attention that it's got online. I would hazard a guess that a Robbie Williams biopic, if Robbie Williams was human, would probably garner less attention."

Robbie Williams. Copyright Miguel Ruiz.

Having been in the limelight as part of a boyband in the early '90s with Take That, Williams was questioned about the recent death of former One Direction member Liam Payne, and the difficulties facing young people in the music industry.

"I think the world needs to be supportive of young people," he said.  "Whether we are in the entertainment industry or not, it seems to be pervasive that everybody's going through something.
Everybody on the planet right now is neurodiverse, has been through trauma, is struggling to come to terms with their childhood, struggling to come to terms with their place in the world.

"If I turn it back to entertainment, it's very difficult, to look after people properly. But it needs addressing and there needs to be a think tank where creative people like myself and others get together. The tragedy of Liam won't go unnoticed. "

Finally, Williams' Croke Park show falls a week after Oasis' highly-anticipated two-night stint at the stadium. The singer was asked on whether or not he feels the often-squabbling Gallagher brothers will make it through their reunion tour.

"I think they're old enough and long enough in the tooth now to understand that they need to facilitate the ability to get through the end of this tour," Williams said. "I'm sure there will be two different factions and there will be a dressing room set up over here on this side of the stadium and another dressing room set up over on the other side of the stadium.

"That said, the entertainment industry has become a little bit vanilla. This tour is definitely not that. In the soap opera of their lives and ours, it's very, very interesting to watch and for music as a whole it's an incredible thing that's happening, for the nostalgia and the people we used to be.

"Music is healing and that huge movement of people that are coming to see them, in one way or another, will be healed."