Blur: the Hyde Park aftermath
Blur at Hyde Park
In the final few weeks of 2008, something unexpected happened. Yes, it had been mooted and thrown around as a rumour for quite some time, but nobody was really sure if it would ever actually come about. Then it did: with sepia-toned photographs of Damon Albarn and Graham Coxon, entwined and grinning, splashed across an NME feature, Blur reformed.
Maybe it wasn’t such an amazing feat after all; Take That and the Spice Girls had set the trend, and Blur’s bassist Alex James had strongly hinted that a reunion was on the cards. It still felt incredibly special though, especially after Coxon and Albarn’s major success with their solo interests had seemed to take them in very different directions. While Coxon veered from the punk-inspired riffage of his 2004-era solo work towards a Nick Drake-style folk in 2009, Albarn built on the foundations of his work as an ethnomusicologist in Africa, developed the innovative Gorillaz project and teamed up with legendary musicians for The Good The Bad & The Queen (2007). Just how would the men behind ‘Parklife’ and ‘Country House’ find a way to meet back in the middle?
On a personal note, Blur were the first “proper” band that mattered to me. Like most 10-year-old girls in 1996, I was enthralled by The Spice Girls but hit a sort of zenith when I belatedly discovered Blur by way of Parklife (1994). Its catchy pop hooks are a draw for anyone who’s a sucker for a good tune but it was the quirks that really grabbed my attention: the stand-alone melancholy of the brass intro to ‘Badhead’, the hypnotic bass drum beats in ‘Girls and Boys’ and the squeal of computer games in ‘Jubilee’. Blur grabbed me in a way that other guitar groups never quite did and there the love affair began, never to be put asunder; a few years ago I wrote my university dissertation on Albarn’s work with Gorillaz, much to the chagrin of my Handel-loving lecturers.
Technically, Blur never split up; like childhood sweethearts, they simply grew apart. It’s easy to see how Coxon became disillusioned with Blur’s new direction on the ever cathartic 13 (1999), especially considering that the previous record Blur (1997) was widely hailed as “Graham’s album” thanks to its rockier and fuzzier presentation.
The central spectacle was soon revealed: a homecoming gig in London’s Hyde Park and their first live show for six years. Those of us who waited with baited breath and hovering cursors for the presale tickets thought we were going to be the lucky few who witnessed the reformation (give or take 50,000 others). Then a glut of other gigs trickled into being: a second Hyde Park date, a small nationwide tour and headline slots at Glastonbury and T in The Park. Were Blur going to end up diluting the effect or punching home the meaning?
I should have been rapturous, having won the chance to see my favourite band with a full roll call (at Leeds Festival 2003 they played without Coxon). Yet instead of being excited beyond belief I got a weird feeling about the whole thing. Coxon told The Sun that he wanted to play songs from Think Tank, even though he originally abandoned the recording sessions for this album partway through as he disagreed with the direction that the music was taking. A second greatest hits album, Midlife, was announced, featuring the uber-rare ‘Popscene’ which had never before been released on an album. These small things just rankled with me, as well as contradicting the things that I held most dear about Blur; in particular their strong sense of independence for such a big band, as well as their tendency to avoid the obvious.
Having somehow managed to shy away from the BBC’s Glastonbury coverage, as well as friends’ reviews and videos of the exclusive Goldsmiths’ College and Rough Trade East shows, I went into Friday’s Hyde Park event with a fresh mind. However, I knew that I wanted new material, the weird and the wonderful. I didn’t really want to hear the pompous brass of the slightly cringeworthy ‘Country House’, a song that the band used to make obvious they hated; not even the lacklustre and predictable ‘Song 2’, not anymore. The ‘greatest hits’ set is, of course what we got. Glimmers of the Blur I love shone through in moments like Modern Life Is Rubbish (1992)’s shimmery buzz track ‘Oily Water’, Blur’s ‘Death Of A Party’ and the super-cool ‘Trimm Trabb’, one of the more experimental tracks on 13. The latter is a song that Coxon allegedly disliked but one that he finished at Hyde Park lying on his back, strumming wildly, face scrunched tight. It just seemed a bit too contrived.
The ballads (‘The Universal’, ‘To The End’, ‘Badhead’) were typically beautiful and highlighted the sweet side of Blur that often gets forgotten behind the ‘Parklife’s and the ‘Girls and Boys’s. ‘Beetlebum’ and ‘For Tomorrow’ were spot on, both era-defining and showcasing Blur’s inherent variety. There is no doubting it was a great show but all too often the day felt overly clichéd. Of course, the vast majority of the crowd happily handed over their £50 awaiting an array of classics, but I’d been hoping for something more. When, in the middle of ‘Out Of Time’, the guy behind me said, “Well, they’re no Oasis, are they?” I felt like I was in the wrong place. Seeing a slim Alex James with white T-shirt and perfectly floppy fringe gnawing on a cigarette, looking like he’d just stepped out of a time machine, just underlined the oddity of the whole event.
This unexpected sense of unease only served to be exacerbated by flashing signs on the stage, highlighting that recordings of tonight’s set were now on sale (the final chord of ‘The Universal’ was still ringing). Blur’s Hyde Park got them rave reviews but from a band I’d always classed as innovators, who pushed boundaries without often realising it, it’s disappointing to say that they played the big easy hand.
Coxon hinted to NME earlier this year that “there could be more to come” from Blur, keeping in line with the band’s uniform ‘never say never’ attitude. I hope this is true, as little would please me more than a new Blur record. Nothing was given away at Hyde Park and it’s boggling to consider the roads they could head down now, given all that has passed since Coxon’s estrangement. Albarn’s foray into the realm of digital music with Gorillaz blurred the line between fiction and reality, as animated cartoons performed live with real musicians. His penchant for characterisation with both Blur and Gorillaz acted as a screen for Albarn, whose struggle with celebrity and fame was well-documented.
Don’t get me wrong – it was fabulous to hear some of my favourite songs played live again. It’s just that, after what had gone before, I was hoping for a little more from the second coming and, to me, it failed to properly deliver.
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