Blur tracks poll - the RESULTS thread

Death of a Party was by far their best dalliance w/ trip-hop imo

Interesting that Death of a Party was written so early, considering it's regarded as their classic Britpop's-last-rites song.

yeah Death Of A Party was very much written in the era when Suede were getting big and Blur were being written off. it's brilliantly miserable. the 7" remix by Adrian Sherwood is a blinder. you could only get it as a kind of official promotional CD single and it cost me a fortune back in the day. loved the sleeve too
http://s.dsimg.com/image/R-677551-1301119559.jpeg

it was great to see it revived as a band favourite 2 years back, appearing not only on the MidLife compilation but also rather amazingly and incongruously bang in the middle of the encore at Hyde Park, right after Song 2 and just before
For Tomorrow.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hu6EomubqN8

Great Specials influence on that one. The spooky organ + the morose, Terry Hall-esque vocal.

Yes, I was going to say it reminds me a lot of Ghost Town, then I thought about the total lack of brass and thought better of it.

http://primetime.unrealitytv.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/top-of-the-pops.jpg

24. Popscene
(8 votes, 177 points)

"Popscene" is a shade over-rated imo compared to maybe some other singles of the era which will be coming up shortly.

Love 'Popscene'. Probably has added appeal to me cos it was a stand alone single not on any album which shouldn't really make any difference but somehow kinda does. My favourite of the shouty blur ones.

See, when "The Celtic Soul Brothers" failed to be a hit, Kevin Rowland did give pause, but carried on with "Come on Eileen" and all went well. Whereas Blur went "oh" and packed it.

which is why we're having this poll now rather than 3 people bigging up their only album and "Popscene".

"Popscene" is undoubtedly over-rated, but its' still great! It has such a great back-story: songwriting breakthrough -> failed single -> left off album -> live favourite. The article from Select lays it out really well. Thanks a mill for linking that btw cajunsunday; brought back happy memories of poring over it and discussing at length with my mates in secondary school. A genius bit of mythmaking.

(xposts)

well....

Had they then released "Never Clever", then carried on with "For Tomorrow", etc, things would have been only slightly different.

xp Seven Days came out somewhere too... Music is my Radar bside maybe? I know I say it on something.. though very possibly a live version

I got that remix single of Death of a Party from a record fair in my completist days. I love popscene, I had it at 3 on my list. Was really gutted when they didn't put it on the best of.

http://www.vblurpage.com/info/songlist/all.htm

No sign of "Seven Days" on here.

The story > the song. I love how Blur and Radiohead almost moved in parallel - a weak debut with big enough hits to put them in the charts while also creating a press backlash, followed by a period of misery and resentment, then the point-to-prove interim single (Popscene, My Iron Lung EP) and the brilliant second record. Both had clever, thorny frontmen who felt they'd been misunderstood and therefore had an "I'll show those fuckers" agenda. It's like a recipe for how to make a classic second record.

yeah Seven Days (BBC session version, 1992) was on Music Is My Radar CD2 . great it is too.
most comprehensive discography is, as always, hither: http://www.discogs.com/artist/Blur

ah, I see what they did!

7 Days (Live on Mark Goodier's Evening Session)
Music Is My Radar b-side

yeah. although Radiohead's interim single was 'Pop Is Dead' mind.

Goodier show was a bloody goldmine back in the day. was also the first place anyone heard recorded versions of Parklife and Bank Holiday, the following Summer in 93.

Sorry, yes, you're right. Not very good but even more of a parallel with Popscene. Good B-side though - Banana Co.

so random question: do Blur fans not rate/dig "This Is A Low"?

or is it one of those things like Cure fans ignoring "Just Like Heaven" because it's too easy to pick

It's my bet for #1.

xp yeah 'Banana Co' was great, better than the A side.

I really like This Is A Low, (esp ~pretty En-ger-lund and me..~) but I was definitely more of a Blur fan for the poppy bits. And Dizzy stole my heart, can't explain that one. I'm in Canada so I had to do some serious mixtape trading when I first got online to add more to my collection! Also bought more $20-30 CD singles than I care to admit to.. not to mention the Japanese imports!

Yeah I love This is a Low (I'm actually a Cure fan who loves Just Like Heaven too) I too wouldn't be surprised if that was number one, that or For Tomorrow.

There were some very fulsome "multiple volume" "deluxe" "versions" of the Blur Albums floating around.

The one for the "Blur" album was five CDs worth, alone.

The story > the song. I love how Blur and Radiohead almost moved in parallel - a weak debut with big enough hits to put them in the charts while also creating a press backlash, followed by a period of misery and resentment, then the point-to-prove interim single (Popscene, My Iron Lung EP) and the brilliant second record. Both had clever, thorny frontmen who felt they'd been misunderstood and therefore had an "I'll show those fuckers" agenda. It's like a recipe for how to make a classic second record.

― We need to talk about Bevan (DL), Tuesday, May 31, 2011 1:48 PM (19 minutes ago) Bookmark

I've always remembered MLIR as being badly received, at least commercially speaking, compared to Leisure. Have I been wrong all these years? On the MLIR tour I saw them at Sussex Uni, pretty small venue, and it felt like they were no longer gonna be the next big thing. Felt like Parklife success came out of nowhere. I've probably remembered it all wrong tbh.

re: 'interim' non album singles in that era; you had Pop Is Dead, Popscene and also
Who Wants To Be The Disco King? by The Wonder Stuff a couple of years previously; all 3 seem to be have lyrical similarities and a non specific beef with some aspect of the industry. weird.

xp yeah the unoffical deluxe albums are all still available from the guys on the official forum. i wish the band would do proper deluxe versions though like the current Suede ones. i'm still dying to see 'B Roads' the follow up to the 'Star Shaped' film was was supposedly *even more* debauched.

yeah critics wise MLIR was pretty much a smash. good-to-great reviews everywhere. Dave Cavanagh at Select did a great full page piece about it and the Melody Maker gave them their first front cover in 12-18 months around the time of Sunday Sunday and also sponsored the Sugary Tea tour that followed. NME naturally enough was miles behind and didn't give em a cover again until Parklife.

your actual turning point was Reading 1993. there's a great blog here that has a copy. it's fantastic. http://blurliveaudioarchiveproject.blogspot.com/2009/10/show-reading-festival-august-1993.html

Many thx for that link to the Select piece, I'd entirely forgotten 'I'm All Over'!!!

I think I was at that Reading Festival. Did Blur play middle of the afternoon on the Saturday and Damon kept disappearing to throw up? Or perhaps that was an earlier Reading appearance?

A friend of mine got so drunk at Reading 92 that he jumped on stage and stole Damon's sunglasses and got chased around for a bit. Blur always describe that gig as their nadir so I like to think my idiot friend played a part in their creative rebirth by making a bad situation even worse.

nah Reading 93 was the following year; a headline slot in the evening where they packed out the small tent, The The were playing the Main stage at the same time. it's recounted as a turning point by the band in the official biog; Stephen Street talks of his shock at hearing the whole crowd doing the "..and then he.." bits in Colin Zeal, which are clearly audible on that bootleg recording above.

God I forgot 'Into Another' as well. Their B sides were just sooo good.

xp yeah the unoffical deluxe albums are all still available from the guys on the official forum.

Could someone clue me into the MLIR one?

yeah it's amazing they pulled it around in 6 months. come Summer 93 they were freaking incendiary even when supporting Duran Duran to a static crowd:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XXN_9Uhiu80&feature=related

:-)

I really wanna watch Showtime again. Not seen it since I was about 16.

Apologies for the delay in the countdown. Real life intruding into poll time. Normal service will be resumed shortly...

http://computersafetytips.files.wordpress.com/2010/05/cars.jpg

okay i'm glad i'm not the only one who loves this :D

23. He Thought Of Cars
(10 votes, 181 points)

I own at least 3 Blur albums (the 'important' ones) and still feel like I hardly know any of the songs from the list. Where are all these coming from?

Really surprised and happy to see this so high. My second favourite song on The Great Escape.

apparently my 2nd favourite Great Escape song too

Somebody was raving about it a while back in a book. It might have been John Harris in this.

oh god me and John Harris sitting in a tree

anyway, on a sad bitter album its melancholy is at least a little less tinged with contempt, replaced with resignation and a clever unwinding vocal line in the verses. "The Universal" just tries too hard to wear its hope on its sleeve, whereas this one wants to drive off up the coast somewhere and disappear. also "Lottery winner buys the moon" :)

http://www.great-seo.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/1way.jpg