Makaleler

TRACKLIST:
    
     01 The Ballad
     02 St. Charles Square
     03 Barbaric
     04 Russian Strings
     05 The Everglades (For Leonard)
     06 The Narcissist
     07 Goodbye Albert
     08 Far Away Island
     09 Avalon
     10 The Heights

Damon Albarn flips a cigarette into his mouth and misses. It’s two weeks until Blur will play two sold-out nights at Wembley Stadium – the first time the band has performed together in London since 2015 – but if there’s any sign of stress, the frontman is keeping it well hidden. His botched Danny Zuko impression, perhaps the only sign of jitters.

In recent weeks there have been a smattering of European festival dates and low-key warm-up shows, played in venues better suited to the Blur of the early '90s – before the Britpop wars, the No. 1s, and the somewhat acrimonious split in 2002 which saw guitarist Graham Coxon leave the band.

There have been reunions since then (some more successful than others), and now in their mid-to-late-50s, Blur are back to play the biggest shows of their career (tickets available here) . But this isn’t just a legacy band looking for a quick buck; Blur have readied a new studio album in The Ballad of Darren, their most poignant and heartfelt record in 24 years. It's an effort that finds Albarn in the midst of major life changes, searching for meaning in the things – and people – that he’s lost.

It’s the night before the band plays Roskilde Festival, one of the last shows before the Wembley double whammy, and Albarn seems fairly chipper, especially about the new music. "The Ballad of Darren is the first legit [Blur] album since 13, " Albarn tells Consequence over a slightly wonky Zoom connection from Denmark.