Early on in The Ballad of Darren, the unexpected and understated Blur reunion album, Damon Albarn sings "We have lost the feeling that we thought we'd never lose," a line that could easily be interpreted as the vocalist addressing his bandmates. Blur lost an intangible feeling during an acrimonious split in the early 2000s, the band limping forward after the departure of guitarist Graham Coxon during the sessions for Think Tank. Within a few years, the group tended to their lingering wounds, healing enough to play the occasional reunion concert, a union that eventually led to The Magic Whip, a happy accident of an album. The Ballad of Darren is something entirely different. Where Coxon crafted The Magic Whip from studio jams the band left behind after a week exiled in Hong Kong, Blur recorded The Ballad of Darren as a unit within the studio, shaping and coloring compositions Albarn wrote while on tour with Gorillaz in 2022. It's how Blur made records back in the '90s but, notably, the group replaced their mainstay Stephen Street with James Ford, a producer who has worked with Arctic Monkeys and Florence and the Machine, not to mention Gorillaz. Ford teases out the louche, loungey aspects of Albarn's songs, lending a lushness to the melancholy undercurrents that flow through The Ballad of Darren. Apart from "St. Charles Square," which announces itself with a flurry of guitar skronk and profanity, there's no direct evocation of Blur's younger days; far from conjuring the ghost of the melodramatic "To the End," the hints of hi-fi sophistication lend weary texture to melodies that sigh and linger. Albarn spends the album pondering severed connections and vanished spaces, sentiments that could be read either as mourning a personal loss or as a meditation on a post-pandemic world, yet The Ballad of Darren doesn't feel precisely sad, not in the way Damon's solo albums often can. Blur gives Albarn's songs depth and dimension, as Graham Coxon decorates the margins left by the elastic rhythms of Alex James and Dave Rowntree. The Magic Whip hinted at the essence of this chemistry but The Ballad of Darren revels in it, resulting in an album that feels age-appropriate without being stodgy: it's mature and nuanced, cherishing the connections that once were taken for granted but now seem precious.Early on in The Ballad of Darren, the unexpected and understated Blur reunion album, Damon Albarn sings "We have lost the feeling that we thought we'd never lose," a line that could easily be interpreted as the vocalist addressing his bandmates. Blur lost an intangible feeling during an acrimonious split in the early 2000s, the band limping forward after the departure of guitarist Graham Coxon during the sessions for Think Tank. Within a few years, the group tended to their lingering wounds, healing enough to play the occasional reunion concert, a union that eventually led to The Magic Whip, a happy accident of an album. The Ballad of Darren is something entirely different. Where Coxon crafted The Magic Whip from studio jams the band left behind after a week exiled in Hong Kong, Blur recorded The Ballad of Darren as a unit within the studio, shaping and coloring compositions Albarn wrote while on tour with Gorillaz in 2022. It's how Blur made records back in the '90s but, notably, the group replaced their mainstay Stephen Street with James Ford, a producer who has worked with Arctic Monkeys and Florence and the Machine, not to mention Gorillaz. Ford teases out the louche, loungey aspects of Albarn's songs, lending a lushness to the melancholy undercurrents that flow through The Ballad of Darren. Apart from "St. Charles Square," which announces itself with a flurry of guitar skronk and profanity, there's no direct evocation of Blur's younger days; far from conjuring the ghost of the melodramatic "To the End," the hints of hi-fi sophistication lend weary texture to melodies that sigh and linger. Albarn spends the album pondering severed connections and vanished spaces, sentiments that could be read either as mourning a personal loss or as a meditation on a post-pandemic world, yet The Ballad of Darren doesn't feel precisely sad, not in the way Damon's solo albums often can. Blur gives Albarn's songs depth and dimension, as Graham Coxon decorates the margins left by the elastic rhythms of Alex James and Dave Rowntree. The Magic Whip hinted at the essence of this chemistry but The Ballad of Darren revels in it, resulting in an album that feels age-appropriate without being stodgy: it's mature and nuanced, cherishing the connections that once were taken for granted but now seem precious.false2023-07-20 19:15:08The Ballad of Darren620232023-07-212023-07-2136Alternative RockIndie Rock11147924074405529e201-1406-4873-b6a7-6b42a59d1b8bba853904-ae25-4ebb-89d6-c44cfbd71bd227cafe53-6ee8-4be7-bdb8-6e28b9a0856b/media/data/media5/Music/Blur/The Ballad of Darren (2023)/folder.jpgBlurAlbumArtistBlurArtistBlurBlurBlur are an English rock band formed in London in 1988. The band consists of singer Damon Albarn, guitarist Graham Coxon, bass guitarist Alex James and drummer Dave Rowntree. Their debut album, Leisure (1991), incorporated the sounds of Madchester and shoegaze. Following a stylistic change influenced by English guitar pop groups such as the Kinks, the Beatles and XTC, Blur released the albums Modern Life Is Rubbish (1993), Parklife (1994) and The Great Escape (1995). As a result, the band helped to popularise the Britpop genre and achieved mass popularity in the UK, aided by a widely publicised chart battle with rival band Oasis in 1995 dubbed "The Battle of Britpop".
Blur's self-titled fifth album (1997) saw another stylistic shift, influenced by the lo-fi styles of American indie rock groups, and became their third UK chart-topping album. Its single "Song 2" brought the band mainstream success in the US for the first time. Their next album, 13 (1999) saw the band experimenting with electronic and art rock styles, and featured more personal lyrics from Albarn and Coxon. Their seventh album, Think Tank (2003), continued their experimentation with electronic sounds and was shaped by Albarn's growing interest in hip hop and world music, featuring more minimal guitar work. Coxon left the band early in the sessions for Think Tank, and Blur disbanded for several years after the album's tour.
In 2009, Blur reunited with Coxon and embarked on a European reunion tour. In the following years, they released several singles and compilations and toured internationally. In 2012, they received a Brit Award for Outstanding Contribution to Music. Their eighth album, The Magic Whip (2015), was their first in twelve years and the sixth consecutive Blur studio album to top the British charts. After the Magic Whip tour, Blur went on hiatus until the release of their ninth album, The Ballad of Darren, in 2023.