There are many good reasons to re-form a band: the solo album has sold eight copies; the trout farm didn’t quite work out; Celebrity Big Brother won’t return your phone calls; there’s no sex, drugs and rock’n’roll in your daily life.
Whenever a bunch of paunchy, middle-aged guys pitch up at a press conference and start wibbling on about “closure” and “differences being set aside”, it’s clear that they all still hate each other’s guts. But with the job centre not really having that many openings for an electric rock guitarist, they’re usually in it for the dosh.
Rock stars are, by their nature, utterly hopeless at anything else but being rock stars. Once you’ve stood astride a speaker at a music festival with big hair and leather trousers and bellowed out “Who wants to rock?” to 100,000 screaming fans, everything else that this world can cough up is going to be a bit underwhelming. When you’ve travelled by private jet, it can be a bit difficult trying to deal with the Ryanair “customer services” desk. Dropping acid in the Kobi Desert to “open your third eye” is a tad different to dropping it while on the school run.
There are, though, plenty of things you can do in your post-rock life: study to be a barrister, make your own cheese, run for political office, write books and newspaper columns, work for Classic FM, write an opera . . .
Actually, the above have all been done by the four members of Blur since their split as a four-piece in 2000 and as a three-piece in 2003. All four have managed to build semi- successful careers outside of the band. Which is why their decision to re-form this week for a series of big shows next year (with a possible new album) is all the more perplexing.
From watching Blur gurning their way through the video for the abysmal Country House song back in their Britpop heyday, as well as their general comportment through that blighted musical period, you’d think that they, above all, would have difficulties readjusting to reality. Their erstwhile rivals, Oasis, by their own admission, always said they had a “car-stereo second hand sales business” to fall back on.
Blur sort of fizzled out after the release of 2003’s Think Tank. Guitarist Graham Coxon had been pushed out a while earlier for having an “attitude problem” (which meant that he drank too much). They had grown to loath the Britpop movement they had helped found, and later efforts saw them go experimental-lite to the detriment of their sales figures.
Albarn and Coxon remained in music: the former with the well- received Mali Music album, followed by The Good, The Bad and The Queen, and then the Chinese opera Journey to the West, which is currently being staged at London’s O2. Coxon’s solo career was quietly acclaimed as he ditched the Britpop riffs for a grungier lo-fi sound.
Drummer Dave Rowntree, meanwhile, has just been selected as a Labour Party candidate in the next general election (before which he trained to be a barrister), while bass player Alex James moved to the country and started to make his own cheese. He also has a show on Classic FM and writes entertaining farm columns. Not quite Motörhead territory then.
Given these commitments and the fact that inter-band relations are still not the best (to employ the showbiz euphemism, Albarn can be a bit “difficult”), and not even touching on the unavoidable truth that Blur’s Britpop-era output doesn’t really stand the test of time, it’s difficult to understand their motivation. It’s not financial.
Whatever the motivation, Blur’s first major show back together will be to a massive outdoor crowd at Hyde Park, London on July 3rd. But bands don’t just re-form for a one-off gig. So Blur will most probably be one of the headliners at next year’s Glastonbury (Paddy Power has them installed as favourites), then tour the European circuit.
What it all means for their operatic/ political/solo/ cheesemaking careers is anyone’s guess. bboyd@irish
times.com
