Ta-dah! They're back! The trio of Jake Shears, Babydaddy, and Del Marquis - aka Scissor Sisters - are coming out of their indefinite hiatus to celebrate 20 years of their self-titled debut album. After 'Let's Have A Kiki' saw them finally conquer their American homeland, they've been radio silent since putting the band to bed back in 2012 - save for 2017's 'Swerlk', a one-off charity collab with MNDR. Of course, nothing's more fetch these days than a nostalgia trip, so they're parading their first project through 10 arenas across the UK and Ireland throughout May 2025. Missing the spotlight? Pension plan? Nah, they're just looking to party.

"That anniversary only comes along once, and it's been a while, so I think we were all ready," beams Shears, stretched out on his sofa and full of life. With Babydaddy and Del Zoomed in from around the world, the trio treat it like a casual conversation, asking each other questions. "I guess these boys haven't been on stage in a while. I've been singing a bit, but y'all haven't; you must all have a bit of an itch?"

"20 years feels like a good excuse," Babydaddy deadpans. "I like being on stage, but I don't dream about it at night because I had so much fun doing it." Before he can explain further, Del puts his two cents in. "If it was your dream, you would've been doing it, but Jake was carrying the flame for this band for a decade, and Babydaddy and I went off and did things very much outside of music, and as natural as the band came together the first time, that's how this felt."

It's not like they spent the last 12 years at each other's throats. Rumours of their demise being caused by constant in-fighting, at least in their opinions, have been greatly exaggerated. They've stayed in touch, supported each other's projects, and even played video games together. It turns out the seeds of their reunion were planted as early as the pandemic.

"We had an airing of our O2 show [the 2020-streamed, 2007-filmed 'Hurrah! A Year of Ta-Dah's'] during the pandemic, where we all moderated it off on the sidelines, watching ourselves back and reacting to our performance," explains Del wistfully, as if blowing off the cobwebs of a 12-year hiatus is really that simple.

"Joking with each other during it made us excited in a way I don't think we were prepared for. It was so much time away that when we were watching this concert, we realised maybe what we could pick up again, or where we had left off, and we were a good band, and it was worth revisiting."

Just as the livestream was missing their Mistress of Ceremonies, Ana Matronic, so too are these live shows. Asking the trio about Ana's absence is like addressing the elephant in a room full of politicians at 10 Downing Street, as Shears' admits, "The 20th anniversary only comes around once, and it's a moment we just didn't want to miss." Babydaddy adds that they "wanted to give Ana an opportunity to work on the stuff she wants to work on, and we want the timing to be right for her when it's right, and in the meantime, this was a big moment for us to really think about."

While the trio are quick to claim "she's still going to be a part of the spirit of that moment for us", with the mama well and truly taken out, they're chomping at the bit for the challenge of performing as a trio.

"It's going to be a matter of having fun stuff up our sleeves; we've always been a band with surprises, and I think it's always fun to subvert people's expectations," says Jake, who's smile is planted firmly back on his face, as Babydaddy adds, "we were always changing things around on stage, we always wanted to keep things exciting for ourselves. There were maybe four or five of us in the beginning in photos, but when we left our last tour, there were seven of us on stage. We just love reconfiguring things on stage."

Whatever the set-up is, and whoever's on stage doesn't matter half as much as the 11 tracks they're playing from start-to-finish. Shears might be leading the charge, but from the glam disco absurdity of opener 'Laura''s piano chimes ringing out on the first night in Nottingham to the psychedelic, Queen-inspired fever dream finale 'Return to Oz' closing out the tour in Dublin, it'll be one big karaoke party for the ages.

Save for a few Shears' solo shows, most of these songs haven't seen the light of day for way longer than the 12 years they've been on hiatus. Sleeper hits like 'Lovers In The Backseat', and the slower, Cher-like synth-number 'It Can't Come Quickly Enough' have been played little.

"It wasn't even a dislike of a song; sometimes the mid-tempo ones just don't connect as much as the uptempo ones or the ballads," says Babydaddy, who singles out 'Lovers In The Backseat' and 'Music Is A Victim' as outliers he's looking forward to learning again. "I don't hear that song around as much, but it's such a fun one to play live, and usually pretty raucous."

He's not the only one. Del has his eye on 'Lovers In The Backseat' as a measure of growth. "We were an immature band, not in a bad way, but with the way that we developed in live performance. We learned by doing, and somehow, we couldn't get our musicianship around that song to bring it from the studio to the stage. So, if there's a reason for us to come back and perform, it's because we're gonna be better as a band, better as musicians, and that's why I want to hear that song because I want to know what it's like to play it with better musicianship."

Saying that, there's over 40 minutes of music for them to rediscover. Easy enough Babydaddy, right? "I'm excited to see whether my brain remembers any of it at all; I wonder if the notes are in there still," he laughs, as Jake roars, "I sure hope so," before Del drops the real reason they're back together, obviously. "I mean, if anything, it's to stave off dementia, right? So we don't lose our minds."

A 10-show run of arenas is no easy feat for a comeback. A lot of their peers have been piling into clubs to dust off the cobwebs, but there's no testing the waters for Scissor Sisters. Just wouldn't feel right, would it?

"We really wanted to be able to do it in a really fun, grand, big way if we could, and it seems like we may be able to pull that off," Babydaddy admits, as Jake steers the venue choice towards their history with this side of the pond. "We love the clubs, but what our arena show became in the UK was a lot of people bringing their entire family, just a bunch of people making it a big party, and we really felt embraced. There was something kind of special we wanted to revisit."

True, Scissor Sisters have always felt like a quintessentially British band. Their Top 10-smashing, Bee Gees-vibing nu-disco cover of Pink Floyd's 'Comfortably Numb' gave them a good start, before Brits fell for the band with a string of super singles: 'Take Your Mama', 'Laura', 'Mary', and 'Filthy/Gorgeous'. Not only did their self-titled debut score a UK Number 1, it became the best-selling album of 2004 and the 38th biggest-selling album of all time here.

"The UK is where we blossomed as a band, and it'll always be that," Shears, who's lived in London for over two years now, spiritedly declares. "There's a connection that I've got, that we've got, with Britain, that's really special."

"Coming over, even from the very beginning, it wasn't just about an embrace of our music; it was an entire culture, everything from the festival culture to the amount of people that tuned into radio constantly. It just wasn't something we were used to in the US," shares Babydaddy. Their birth in the New York club scene just didn't do it the same. "Music appreciation was there, but in the UK it's just so embedded into the culture and that was so exciting to us, and that's why we wanted to keep coming back over."

Scissor Sisters not only emerged as the saviours of the disco, a nu-pop experiment needed as the world was readying for landfill indie to explode, but as flagbearers for queer culture. From their feverish, fantastical videos to their on-stage personas and open-book lyrics, the band helped pave the way for artists across the LGBTQ+ community to find success.

"I think it's a really great measure of progress, of where we are culturally and where we are with music, and where we are with LGBTQ+ rights, and the amount of LGBTQ+ artists that are out there now, comparatively to then," says Jake proudly, as Babydaddy agrees wholeheartedly, "It's really worth appreciating, too, how the UK felt so far ahead in terms of that acceptance, and allowing us to be who we are without even making it a huge deal, and even a huge centre of who we were; people came out to hear the music because they loved the songs, and the queer thing was secondary.

"The embrace for the queer side of what we do was so instantaneous from the beginning. I remember our record label, like never was there a moment of them saying 'you should tone that down', they were ready to move forward with the way we wanted to do it."

Talking of moving forward, their two-week run for their self-titled debut ends before the summer, and then festival season comes a-knocking. Will we see them there? What's next for the trio?

Not a lot, actually. "The door is open, the door is open…" Jake offers, as Babydaddy hesitantly suggests, "We're dipping our toes in the water". Whether their lips are sealed for something bigger - they've always had a home at Glastonbury - or they're simply in it for a one-and-done run, they play any talk of the future down in favour of living in the present.

"I love performing live so much that I want us to have a really good time, and I think if you have a great time doing something, it leads to more. My imagination goes all sorts of places," says Jake.

Babydaddy closes the subject succinctly, "You'll have as much an idea as we do about what's going to happen after this, but that's what's exciting about it for us. I do think anything could happen; convince your friends to show up and there's a better chance we'll keep doing it."