Sorry to be flippant but I think they will struggle to become a really seriously respected band because of him.

It all seems a bit too contrived with Damon, he has his cockney cheeky chappy Fred Perry wearing persona back on for the Blur reunion and it will probably change when he does his next project.

BUT I have to admit musically they did come over very well on the Glastonbury coverage and you realize they have written some great songs and Graham Coxon is a truly inventive guitarist.

I remember being at Glastonbury when they were struggling to get away from the sound of their first album and find an identity and they were a bit of a mess, a speaker stack fell over on Damon's foot, amazingly he carried on singing to his credit!.

I thought "Pop Scene" was a great song and then "For Tomorrow" but sort of lost interest until the albums "Blur" and "13" came out but it all seemed to go pear shaped with the last album.

Can't honestly see them being heralded as a "definitive" band though.

Mockney twats was my considered opinion.

I hated the song Park Life and Girls and Boys was a hateful piece of middle class slumming as far as I was concerned. Country House was beyond stinking and as for all that hanging out with Keith Allen and Damien Hirst? Crap.

And yet fast forward a bit... Song 2 was ace. Tender was actually tender. He Thought Of Cars I always liked. Get Out Of Cities had me jumping about like a loon. I hate getting proven wrong, and not even by a fan, by the actual band I was so vociferously full of hate against.

Even the pillock on the bass seems less annoying than he was. Curse them...

In a clearly less spectacular setting, Blur were equally brilliant at the Manchester MEN on Friday night.

I could live without She's So High and would have liked them to have squeezed in Starshaped and Sing, but I'm in total agreement with Chimney... For me, the gig went beyond nostalgia (which is one of the reasons I went) and became something genuinely special. I can’t think of a contemporary of theirs with a better back catalogue.

Let’s hope they keep it together and release a new album.

You've done every f****r else! I watched it lying on my settee - thought they were f***ing brilliant. Albarn (the t**t, as some t**t puts it) was superb.

that's the one I like.
There a few of things however that do grate about blur firstly and obviously the whole cheese thing, then there's Damon's affected lispy whistle and then have you heard coxon speak what is going on there nobody out side a Mike Leigh films talks like that it's rubbish.
apart from that nothing wrong with blur.

The fact that the likes of Coldplay and The Libertines were once hailed as great new bands only serves to highlight just how good Blur were.

In a drunken pub conversation the other night, discussion got round to Blur, and how - whenever they needed to write a great pop single - they did. There's no Other Way started them off; when they were struggling (and very close to being dropped) they did Girls and Boys; when no-one seemed to like them, they still managed The Universal; after The Oasis 'war', they did Beetlebum/ Song 2 and then produced Tender. All great songs - with tunes and everthing!

Perhaps my only problem with Blur is that Damon always seemed to be a bit of a (albeit highly talented) pastiche-merchant. Baggy's doing well, so we need a dancy hit? Yep, he can do that. Need a Kinks style sing-along? He's your man. A bit of lo-fi? Can do that too. It's that sort of diversity that probably stops them being many people's fave group. I know that the Beatles etc. were diverse, but they were innovative, whereas Blur seemed to be master-copyists of different genres. In many ways that's not meant to denigrate them, as they were often better than what they were copying!

and Gorillaz aren't too bad either

Even if Damon is a t**t

Especially 'Think Tank'. What an album! I reckon Damon is a serious talent. Great songwriter. Plus, Gorillaz, Good the Bad etc. Bloke's a genius.

Blur were rubbish, they are rubbish, and probably will remain rubbish. SORRY, just thought I should add some balance here.

Oh and Damon is a tw*t, but not as much as Alex. In fact the only guy I don't hate is the drummer bloke and that is because he mostly keeps his mouth shut. Ah, I feel so much better now.

Just noticed this thread after going on about blur in another thread. Nothing prepared me for haw amazing they were on Sunday night at Glasto.

I was in college between 1992 and 1998, a good time for albums, gigs and student discos with contemporary tunes from Suede, blur, Oasis, Supergrass, Pulp, Radiohead and fun singles from many also-rans. I got each blur album as they came out and liked them to various degrees: ParkLife, a wonderful record, The Great Escape - still not much loved by me, 97's blur - now that's more like it.

The performance on Sunday was not by a contemporaneous band, but rather celebrated a varied body of work which has now had enough time to have embedded itself and have meaning in the lives of thousands of people. That powered the joy on Sunday night. You might think that certain individual members of blur are fools, that's fine, but the four of them serve the band, and blur the band isn't foolish.

The argument that they were pastiche-merchants doesn't really stick when the body of work is taken as a whole - it seems to me the default position of assault on blur for people who crave some form of earnest authenticity . In their heyday there were a talented and creative bunch of people who created some fine trigger songs.

Trigger songs? You know that point at a gig, where the act heads into the opening notes of some big hit and the trigger is that everyone goes mental? Well pretty much every song blur did on Sunday was a trigger song: Girls & Boys, End of a Century, ParkLife, Tender, Country House, The Universal, Song 2 etc, etc

There's a poster for the new blur compilation I've seen on the underground and it has on it, written out, the phrase "Confidence is a preference of the habitual voyeur of what is commonly known as Parklife." I had never realised before what an extraordinary line that is. How would anyone come to writing a line like that? Who would have thought it would roll of the tongues of many as one of the defining hits of the decade?

I always liked blur, after Sunday night I now love them. I'm now sure though if I want them to make a new album...

PS Albarn's voice has really improved. He really seems much more in control of it these days, really powerful, he was the most surprising on Sunday

Listen to 'Sweet Song' off 'Think Tank' or 'No Distance Left To Run' off '13'.
Made out of melody.

Can I just say, to all of the people who call Damon a tw**, that had it not been for him and a song called "Charmless Man" I would never have got into music at the end of 1996? I was 10. At the time all I was into was Games Workshop. Nuff said.

Top 5 blur/Damon creations:

Showtime: Ally Pally in 95.
13: for the more inventive tracks - Mellow Song, 1992, etc.
slower songs: To The End, No Distance Left To Run, This Is A Low, etc
All Alone: bass heavy Gorillaz + Roots Manuva masterpiece
Live Forever: Damon's interviews and mini guitar moments are fascinating

in London tonight. Hottest day of the year, amazing crowd, fantastically re energised band rattling through fantastically energising and gorgeous back cat. AND no new album to flog.

Amazing scenes. As the kids say. Oh i'm heroically off my box like but it still stands.

....of Parklife or Country House. Always avoided that side of the band but aside from that I love a bit of Blur. Saw them 3 times during the 90's. '93, '97 and their greatest hits tour in '99. Each time they were great. Loved watching the Glastonbury performance on BBC2. Superb. Friends of mine are off to see them at Hyde Park this weekend............have to say i'm a little jealous.

Great band?? Most definitely. I don't buy the anti-Albarn feeling. I've never had that opinion of him, always seems a decent and rather talented fellow.

and have done since I heard "There's No Other Way" back in.... ooohh... 1993? bit earlier than that? I'm crap with dates. anyway.

I was there at their Mile End gig... have seen them several times since. Utterly gutted not to have seen them at Glastonbury or Hyde Park recently... although was rather happy that Damon popped up as a surprise guest at the Dan Zanes gig at the RFH recently.

AND I've nursed the same planet-sized crush on Alex James since 1993 (or whenever). I know, I know, I'm on my own with that one.

It feels like there's been a lot of goodwill towards Blur these last few weeks. It's easy to see why as the band fell out and now they've kissed and made up. Everyone loves a happy ending. Everyone was willing them to be brilliant. Their set list at Glastonbury was a good summing up of their back catalogue and I'd have to say it is pretty underwhelming. I guess it's all down to personal preference. I have a lot of time for the individual members of the band as they are always a good listen when interviewed. However, I honestly don't think they've done that many good songs. Ironically, one of their most popular, Song 2, is an attempt at sounding like Nirvana. I'm sure they were fully aware of the irony on its release.

They sound at their best when Coxon was trying to sound like Steve Malkmus of Pavement. But Pavement's top tunes knock the socks off Blur.

I'll put my cards on the table and say of the British bands formed in the 90's, the one I personally think have the best back catalogue are the Super Furry Animals. Listen to their albums (or a greatest hits compilation) and they have been consistently brilliant. Gruff Rhys is as imaginative and experimental as Damon, to better effect IMHO. Again, it's all down to personal preference.

Wow, amazed no-one has suggested "blur: are shite" yet. Not many Mogwai fans in the massive then?

That said, I saw Blur at Glastonbury (not on telly), and thought they were fantastic. Like them quite a bit, but they were excellent on Sunday, and a perfect way to close the festival. And they've got some cracking tunes as well. Good job Blur!

Just in from Hyde Park. No surprises having seen them at Glasto but I did make it to the barrier at the front and surrendered myself to the crowd carnage. Haven't done that in a while, probably not since a blur gig of yore.

I ache a lot.

I saw them at glasto and again at Hyde Park last night. I've never loved them, and share the anti-Albarn instinct, but they were brilliant. A couple of slightly strange song choices (Jubilee and that appalling megaphone song should be in no greatest hits set) just showed up how good the rest of their stuff is. I howled along like a baboon the whole way through.

Was it just me, or did Damon's horrible gold front tooth fall out during the glasto set?

I enjoyed their set despite Dave Rowntree's ever decreasing and increasing tempos in nearly every song!

The band that put off my already sceptical wife from attending concerts. They were promoting their new sound (Song 2 etc,) in Milan and left the stage in a huff after 2 songs when the locals kept requesting them to play some old.

That said, I enjoy their music and recently downloaded Think Tank which completely passed me by on release