After a triumphant – and unexpected – comeback this year, Damon Albarn has signaled that he is once again pulling the plug on Blur.
Speaking to the French magazine Les Inrockuptibles (as reported by Far Out), he described the 2023 reunion as a “beautiful success” but revealed that he now plans to step back from the band he formed in 1988 with childhood friend Graham Coxon until further notice.
“It is time to wrap up this campaign,” he told the magazine. “It’s too much for me. It was the right thing to do and an immense honor to play these songs again, spend time with these guys, make an album, blah-blah-blah.
“I’m not saying I won’t do it again, it was a beautiful success, but I’m not dwelling on the past.”
Blur surprised fans in late 2022 when they announced their return from an effective eight-year hiatus with two headlining dates at London's 90,000 capacity Wembley Stadium. The July 2023 gigs – with support coming from Paul Weller, Self Esteem, Sleaford Mods, The Selector and Jockstrap – were rapturously received; Mojo described them as “celebratory as it’s possible to be” and Louder Than War claimed: “It’s clear Blur are on top form… it’s not about nostalgia. Rather, it’s a momentous celebration of dreams coming true and different lives colliding.”
Blur also performed an intimate concert for Radio 2 in front of just 300 fans at the BBC’s Maida Vale studios, at which Albarn told the crowd: “We all love each other, right?”
Blur's 2023 Wembley Stadium gigs were a celebration of the band's 35 year career.
Those shows were immediately followed by a new album, The Ballad of Darren, their first new material since 2015’s The Magic Whip. The LP became their seventh consecutive #1 in the UK, and also peaked at #8 in the U.S. Top Album Sales chart.
Speaking at the time, drummer Dave Rowntree described the band’s studio reunion in glowing terms. “There was magic in the air,” he told the NME. “Everything we tried, worked... Most of what you hear on the record are first or second takes, which gives it a freshness. In the end, we started about 25 songs and finished 18, maybe. Halfway through, we were thinking of maybe doing two albums – but that didn’t happen.”
However, it seems Albarn is now moving on from The Ballad of Darren, telling Les Inrockuptibles simply that: “I haven’t listened to it again.”
They get up when they want (except on Wednesdays): Blur in 2023.
Instead, the singer says that he plans to focus on “new things” in 2024, including a trip “to India with Jamie [Hewlett] to start working on a new Gorillaz album,” and, most intriguingly, an “opera which will be presented in Paris next year,” adding, “once you’ve tackled an opera, everything else seems easier.”
Meanwhile, guitarist Graham Coxon will also be concentrating on his side project, The Waeve, supporting Elbow on a UK arena tour in May.
Despite Albarn’s announcement, fans needn’t panic just yet. Blur have taken extended breaks before – most notably from 2002 to 2008, following Coxon’s six-year departure, and then again from 2015 until last year. Following that pattern, perhaps we should expect new material sometime around 2031.
