4 out of 5

Label: Virgin

Producer: Stephen Street

I realize this should probably be five stars, since its in the induction point for a lot of us (me included) and signaled Albarn’s intentions of going weirder in the years to come, but there’s a dash of ‘put on’ to ‘Blur’ which prevents it from ringing true as pure pop mastery; that is, from the punky tear of ‘Song 2’ and the interestingly titled ‘Look Inside America,’ there’s a wink of coastal crossover appeal happening here.  Accepted that Blur were hardly underground, mind you, and any Rolling Stone reader at the time would’ve already been well aware of Parklife, but I was a teenager watching MTV and maybe some earlier singles triggered memories, but I didn’t own a Blur album until this one.  So it’s entirely catchy, and incredibly varied and inventive – whoda’ thunk easy-access groups like Nirvana and Soundgarden would find a place next to the folky boingo explosions of ‘Country Sad Ballad Man’ – but years later, that seems purposeful.  A note of stylized oddity over finding a great song, as though the crew had their choruses and hooks and then said – okay, we’ve got a rock song (‘Song 2’) and a sing-along (‘On Your Own’) and a moody track (‘Death of a Party’)… oh, let’s work in some electro-pop (‘M.O.R.’), and etc.  True enough, this could be said for a billion albums, but there’s something continually assured about the Blur sound that the effectiveness of almost every album they did, from start to finish, sounds natural, which is what always set them apart, for me, from the forcefulness of Oasis.  Follow-ups ’13’ and ‘Think Tank’ might not be perfect albums either, but their quirks again come across as natural – song first, layers looped in.

And lest you think I’m trying to purposefully find fault, I sort of assumed this was going to be a five star listen.  I’ve definitely put the album through its paces over the years and felt connection to various tracks at various points, but I also realize, now listening to it more critically, that it’s not the first Blur disc I reach for.

This is also besides the immense positives of the disc.  Through a layer of remove or not, the fascinating mixture of styles makes it – and made it – a thrilling listen, though the middle third of the album always tends to blend together to me for some reason.  Stephen Street’s longstanding relationship with the group results in a rich, sharp sound that’s synced to the sensational feel of the songwriting, and Albarn’s lyrics find a clever and accessible balance of emotions at many, many memorable points.  It is, by all means, an excellent album, and had another group laid it upon us, perhaps the veneer wouldn’t be as apparent.  But such is the ‘cost’ of being a great band – saps like me are inevitably going to compare it all and say what we will.