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Blur -
Think Tank
Reviewed
by
Q,
May 2003
Um...
Bongo!
It's
Damon albarn's world beat album. No, come back!
 Damon
albarn has always appeared to thrive on conflict--with
the world, with other bands, within his own band, with
his own identity. Spiritually, he's both a lover and a
fighter, a dewy-eyed romantic who can get competetive
over who'e just bought the best baldness-concealing hat.
And, musically, much of the creative conflict in Blur
derived from his relationship with recently departed
guitarist Graham Coxon.
For a band to lose its guitaris in the early
stages of recording a new album could be considered
careless, particularly if that guitarist is one of the
very best. There's no shining precedent for great bands
dumping their mercurial leading musician and carrying on
unscathed: remember the Clash's Cut The Crap
"comeback" without Mick Jones? But then, recent
offerings suggested this once-inspired partnership was
playing itself out. On the deeply unlovable Music is My
Radar (the new track on 2000's Best Of) they appeared
bound together in pointless, bloody-minded one-upmanship;
Albarn singing like an addled Mick Jagger while Coxon
teased exploding elephants from his guitar because,
really, what else was there to do? With Coxon now
painfully ejected, the situation has obviously
necessitated a rethink and, as we know, Blur do like a
good rethink ("britpop? No, not us..." etc).
In the four years since last album 13,
Albarn hasn't seemes overly pained by Blur's absence.
When not dominating the international dance-pop arena
with Gorillaz, he's struck a peacealbe, questing figure,
taking his melodica round corners of the globe not used
to seeing many former Britpop luminaries. The result was
2002's amiable Mali Music project. At times the only
thing missing from the post-millennial Peter Gabriel
picture was a funny little beard.
With session taking place in Marrakech, and
Norman Cook and William Orbit assisting Ben Hillier on
production duties, everything looks set for Blur's
world-dance direction, the mutant offspring of Mali Music
and Gorillaz. Actually, though, the pale blue ballads and
scratchy grooves on blur's seventh album Think Tank feel
endearing, playful, fluent, easy and eccentrically
melodic. The songs are dressed up in enough ambient
washed, tin-pt loops, keyboard and (gulp!) funky rhythms
that, when they arrive at the checkpoint going,
"Guitar-pop? No, not us...." you're actually
inclined to believe them.
There are numerous departures here, the main
one being that it's barely ever in-your-face. At times
these languid ruminations suggest a walk in the park,
but, instead of Parklife's joggers and gutlords, today
it's the dewy grass and sunshine that catch the eye.
So, sadly for the worls of comedy, Blur
never actively realize the ludicrous potential of their
new "we got riddim" direction (although onstage
dancing remains a worry). There are guitars (Damon
revives his rudimentary strumming from the Gorillaz
album), but they are rarely central. The beat-driven
tracks veer towards the arty, white boy-with-beatbox line
of Talking Heads and The Clash (actually, the low-slung
hip-pop of Moroccan Peoples Revolutionary Bowls Club even
recalls Big Audio Dynamite). Only the trudging, tedious
six-minute squib Jets really need taking back to the
shops.
Opener Ambulance has clattering 80's drum
machines, sax, pinging keyboards, inky backing vocals and
Damon Albarn declaring with winsome triumph: "I
ain't got nothing to be scared of/Cos I love you".
After groping tentatively out from the foggy gloom, the
song rallies itself into a more processional pulse that
almost suggests that post-hip hop space-jazz orchestra
that Albarn doubtless imagines.
On The Way To The Club, meanwhile, is dubby
and mysterious, a glassy-eyed celebration of nocturnal
thrills that ends with a cascade of woozy synths. Less
astoundingly, Brothers and Sisters suggests the Happy
Mondays in stewed Delta blues mode. Never quite finding a
killer hook, its stoned momentum remains slyly compelling
thanks partly to Alex Jame's bassline. In the absence of
those guitars, his loose-limbed lines--funky without
trying to join Sly & The Family Stone--centre pretty
much everything here.
Aside from Gene By Gene (late Clash crammed
aboard a clown's jolopy with a pinball machine for
company), the album's prime Fatboy Slim moment is
come-an-have-a-go rocker Crazy Beat. Coolly effective
with an archly yobbish "yeah yeah yeah!"
chorus, it's britpop/big beat hybrid take on The Stooges'
I Wanna Be Your Dog. Surely a hit.
Even those dreaded "world"
influences are used lightly: politely pretty single Out
of Time tingles with Andulusian strings; the lulling,
half-lit Caravan easily inhabits a faintly Eatern
European melancholy. Indeed, almost everything coheres
around a beaten-up junk-shop fell. Quite appealingly,
this album sounds squeaky, like it needs a spot of oil.
According to Albarn, the lyrics concern
"love and politics". In fact, the allusion to
the iniquities of drug policy, blowing up deserts and a
world spinning out of time never really register. The
"political" intent here essentially amounts to
sticking up a hippy V-sign and saying "Peace,
brother".
Love, though, arrives in abundance. The
plainly pretty melodies of these ballads are a real
pleasure after 13's small portions. Ignore their
self-consciously under-done title--Good Song and Sweet
Song spiritually revisit old wonders like Blue Jeans and
Badhead, happy-sad tunes about living that might just be
the soul of Blur's canon. The former suggests The Beach
Boys signed to Twisted Nerve; the latter--with its muted,
Erik Satie-like piano, angelic ambience and ambiguous,
tugging tune--is even better. Like an injection of pure
heartache, it's more touching than any of 13's rather
stagy, declamatory love songs.
More ambiguous still is bruised finale
Battery in Your Leg. Coxon's only appearance, it's and
almost-too-good reminder of the hole he's left behind.
Over Albarn's pointedly tender salute, the guitarist
unveils some head spinning flurries that suggest Kevin
Shields toying with exotica. It's a marvellous
performance, but it also poses question about where Blur
go now. Despite the flaws here--the second half's too
variable, the lyrics not sufficiently
distinguished--their efforts to fill the guitar gap have
produced a likeable, original work that sees them
progress while largely avoiding
"experimentation".
But, without Coxon around, Blur are no
longer defined by the rough and tumble, the frayed nerves
or--to quote producer William Orbit on the 13
sessions--the sense of blood on the studio floor. Even at
it's most troubled, this music exudes an odd calm, a
supine surrender to the emotions and sensations. Albarn
has apparently hung up his sword and stopped making a
scene to concentrate on the love thing instead. This
newly tranquil Blur is a genuine novelty and for now, at
least, that's enough.
(4/5)
Steve
Lowe
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