67. ‘Theme From An Imaginary Film’

B-side of ‘Parklife CD and cassette. Produced by Stephen Street.

In the summer of 1993, playwright and actor Steven Berkoff had his producer approach Blur to write a new song for Decadence, a film he was making of his successful West End play of the 1980s. An early edit of the film (starring Berkoff and Joan Collins) was given to Damon. He came up with an instrumental, a brisk waltz (actually it’s almost in 6/8 time) with a lavish arrangement for strings, piano and harpsichord that was unlike anything Blur had attempted: lush and musically grandiose. Berkoff liked the music, but wanted words and singing.

With lyrics and excellent vocal from Damon, the song (at this point called ‘Decadence’) was recorded by Street in a separate four-day session to ‘Parklife’, in October 1993 – just prior to embarking on a Japanese tour (see 66) – at Matrix’s sister studio, Matrix 2, in Fulham, Berkoff rejected the vocal version immediately. It is perhaps easy to see why. Damon’s lyric of tarnished romance is highly proper (“What if I flew like a dove, dear/What if I wooed you in rhyme?”) and its strength is its airy poesy. Two mentions of the word “arse” serve to perplex; on first listen it sounds like a couched dig at Brett Anderson. Decadence, a film about the unspeakable behaviour of the upper classes, clearly required music of a harsher stripe.