Blur—The Great Escape

Blur—The Great Escape

The Great Escape—After releasing a sensational hit that would eventually be certified quadruple-platinum, most artists would be content repeating the formula. On the surface, Blur did just that after the era-defining Parklife: its follow-up The Great Escape generated four even more successful singles (and an additional one in Japan). However, it has come to not be as fondly remembered as Parklife; lead singer Damon Albarn himself has said The Great Escape is one of two bad records he's made, calling it messy and, by way of comparison to another band's work, empty.¹ It went toe-to-toe in its own time with Oasis' (What's the Story) Morning Glory?, which by virtue of its greater success perhaps proved fans were satisfied with one volume of Parklife's quirky brand of Kinks-cum-Smiths pop.

The Great Escape saw Blur paying homage to a wider range of music greats and was more bipolar and abrasive than its predecessor; while Albarn's claims of messiness are not unfounded, it also has some unjustly-forgotten material. Bassist Alex James quipped at the time that "Darklife" was among the rejected album titles,² and while he may have been joking, it is not at all a misnomer. The songs are much more trenchant and critical than Parklife's, which had its share of lament and observational wit, but was hardly hostile. The opener "Stereotypes," for example, is a blaring mishmosh of synthesizer and guitar that lines dry lyricism of wife-swapping. As one of the less-rewarding songs, it is peculiar that it opens the set, but it makes more sense framed as an open disdain of continuing the Parklife sound. "Country House" would have been the more obvious choice, considering it was the lead single, hitting #1 over Oasis' "Roll with It" while taking a shot at the same band ("He's got morning glory/And life's a different story") and it is truly a great pop song; it marks a return to the band's traditional alt-rock sound of Leisure and Modern Life Is Rubbish—which, through the annals of time, has been obscured by the enduring popularity of Parklife, which often is viewed as representative of Blur's overall sound. The only difference here is the incorporation of a horn section, signaling one or more band members' fascination with ska.

"Best Days" is a dreary, minor-key affair, and one of the best, incorporating variations on A chords in its chorus' interesting progression (the colorful CD booklet, in fact, denotes every one of these chord changes throughout the album). "Charmless Man" is a more straightforward rock song, but a great one, sometimes purported to describe Suede frontman Brett Anderson, ex-boyfriend of Albarn's then-girlfriend, Justine Frischmann. "Fade Away," sounding almost like fun-house music, is a misanthropic snapshot of people with empty lives that only become emptier. "Top Man" is the most obvious ska tribute, borrowing liberally from Fun Boy Three's "The Lunatics (Have Taken over the Asylum);" "The Universal" began life as such—a ska song for Parklife—but ended up a watershed for Blur, marking their most notable early use of strings, and turned into a beautiful piece, with an excellent climax featuring Albarn snarling, "Every paper that you read/Says tomorrow's your lucky day/Well, here's your lucky day."

"Mr. Robinson's Quango" is a tart, raunchy number that fires shots at nonspecific political figures. "He Thought of Cars" is a markedly obvious David Bowie tribute with half-referential, half-nonsensical lyrics and winding, spacey music (cf. "The Bewlay Brothers"): curious, but somewhat useless; "It Could Be You" instead borrows conventions from the power-pop era, which better suits Blur. "Ernold Same" features then-MP Ken Livingstone and is usually said to reference Pink Floyd's "Arnold Layne," but possibly relates better to the Jam's "Smithers-Jones." "Globe Alone" follows "Jubilee" from the last album and foreshadows the further pop-punk styling of "Song 2" and "Chinese Bombs." Albarn turns autobiographical on the seductive, anagrammatic "Dan Abnormal" (subtitled "The Meanie Leanie"); worth noting is the fact that two Elastica albums credit a keyboard player named "Norman Balda." "Entertain Me" is reminiscent of Bowie's Scary Monsters. Buried at the end is "Yuko and Hiro," one of the sweetest songs Blur had yet recorded, with a sung Japanese verse, altogether probably a nod to Blur's popularity in that country.

There is truth to Albarn's remark that The Great Escape is messy—it runs almost an hour long, and a good duration is devoted to somewhat pointless if often pleasant mimicry—but it is certainly not, as he claims, bad. Its singles are arguably the best they ever cut, and the roomy rock sound, unique synthetic tones, and generally fitting string and horn parts were welcome changes for Blur. It's no masterpiece, but it has enough strokes of genius to warrant its addition to any fan's collection.

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1 digitalspy.com/music/news/a46469/damon-albarn-criticizes-blur-albums.html#~pgE9JFzZBQEmvF^↩
2 moozine.co.uk/blurcentral/albumsthegreatescape.htm^↩