5 Reasons People Laugh About Your Charger

Blur Songs, Albums, Reviews, Bio & More

Ultimately, the band did play, albeit an hour and a half after they were scheduled to appear. After the completion of the reunion dates, James said the group had not discussed further plans, and Albarn told Q soon after that Blur had no intention of recording or touring again. He said, "I just can't do it anymore", and explained that the main motivation for participating in the reunion was to repair his relationship with Coxon, which he succeeded at. Coxon also said that no further Blur activity was planned, telling NME.com in September, "We're in touch and we say 'Wotcha' and all that but nothing has been mentioned about any more shows or anything else". The event does not bubble, but the related focusout event that follows does bubble. Originally, this event was only applicable to form elements, such as .

The result was Blur, the band's fifth studio album, released in February 1997. Although the music press predicted that the lo-fi sonic experimentation would alienate Blur's teenage girl fan-base, they generally applauded the effort. Despite cries of "commercial suicide", the album and its first single, "Beetlebum", debuted at number one in the UK. Although the album could not match the sales of its predecessors in Britain, internationally Blur was more successful. In the US, the album received strong reviews, reached number 61 on the Billboard 200 and was certified gold. The album's "Song 2" single was also popular on alternative radio, reaching number six on the Billboard Modern Rock chart and remaining on that chart for 26 weeks.

Alex James later summarised, "After being the People's Hero, Damon was the People's Prick for a short period ... basically, he was a loser – very publicly." During the two-month American tour, the band became increasingly unhappy, often venting frustrations on each other, leading to several physical confrontations. After a poor performance at a 1992 gig that featured a well-received set by Suede on the same bill, Blur were in danger of being dropped by Food. By that time, Blur had undergone an ideological and image shift intended to celebrate their English heritage in contrast to the popularity of American grunge bands like Nirvana. Although sceptical of Albarn's new manifesto for Blur, Balfe gave assent for the band's choice of Andy Partridge to produce their follow-up to Leisure.

NME magazine wrote in 1991, " are acceptable pretty face of a whole clump of bands that have emerged since the whole Manchester thing started to run out of steam." Modern Life Is Rubbish turned out to be a dry run for Blur's breakthrough album, Parklife. Released in April 1994, Parklife entered the charts at number one and catapulted the band to stardom in Britain. The stylized new wave dance-pop single "Girls and Boys" entered the charts at number five; the single managed to spend 15 weeks on the U.S. charts, peaking at number 52, but the album never cracked the charts. Initially, Blur were one of the multitude of British bands that appeared in the wake of the Stone Roses, mining the same swirling, pseudo-psychedelic guitar pop, only with louder guitars. In the process, the group broke down the doors for a new generation of guitar bands that became labeled as Brit-pop.

Food was ready to release the record, but the group's U.S. record company, SBK, believed there was no American hit single on the record and asked them to return to the studio. Blur complied and recorded "Chemical World," which pleased SBK for a short while; the song would become a minor alternative hit in the U.S. and charted at number 28 in the U.K. Modern Life Is Rubbish was set for release in the spring of 1993 when SBK asked Blur to re-record the album with producer Butch Vig . The band refused and the record was released in May in Britain; it appeared in the United States that fall.

That concert at Hyde Park was released digitally the following week as Parklive; it later came out as a physical release that year. The NME concurred, saying Blur were "a reunited band making music to rival their very best". It was also a commercial success, becoming the sixth consecutive Blur LP since Parklife to top the British charts.

Following a stylistic change influenced by English guitar pop groups such as the Kinks, the Beatles and XTC, Blur released Modern Life Is Rubbish , Parklife and The Great Escape . As a result, the band helped to popularise the Britpop genre and achieved mass popularity in the UK, aided by a chart battle with rival band Oasis in 1995 dubbed "The Battle of Britpop". In February 2012, Blur were awarded the Outstanding Contribution to Music award at the 2012 Brit Awards. Later that month, Albarn and Coxon premiered a new track together live, "Under the Westway".

In February 1998, a few months after completing the tour, Blur released Bustin' + Dronin' for the Japanese market. The album is a collection of Blur songs remixed by artists such as Thurston Moore, William Orbit and Moby. Among the tracks, the band were most impressed by Orbit's effort and enlisted him to replace Street as producer for their next album, citing a need to approach the recording process from a fresh perspective.

The band were once hailed as one of the vanguards of the scene, with the front cover of April 1993’s issue ofSelectmagazine featuring Anderson backed by a Union Jack, an iconic moment in the genre’s story. Every umbrella term coined to represent a movement eventually gets denigrated by those once closely involved. Whether it be the current crop of post-punk acts or those working within nu-metal, the instances of this are numerous. While all ‘scenes’ have their own stories, none are as polarising asBritpop. Lots of formerly strictly delineated categories get blurred together, and one of them is narrative and marketing, story and advertising. There's not a lot to say about it other than it seems to blur the boundaries between life and art.

Trey Lance is still learning how to read NFL defenses, and the game is often a blur for rookies. Join our mailing list to keep up to date with the the latest blur news.