Modern Life Is Rubbish

-I had an ex in college who was obsessed with Britpop, so I think I'm relatively familiar with the genre (for an American). I've liked quite a bit of Britpop, but still the most celebrated, iconic albums of the genre are pretty so-so.

-This definitely sounds like an "homage" to a bunch of quintessentially British bands. There is a musical nationalism here I find quite frustrating and unappealing.

-the vocal harmonies sound pretty nice.

-I rarely say this, but the album is too long. If they cut 5-6 songs, it would improve significantly.

I like Blur and whilst this album has the basic early blur hallmarks (cheeky cockney chappies singing about Bacardi Breezers and Steak & Kidney pie, possibly) it doesn't really have the memorable hooks to make any of these songs stick in the mind. It's no The Great Escape or even my favourite, the self titled 5th album. Not really worthy to be on this list.

My thought process whilst listening to this fluctuated between "this actually isn't half bad, probably the best Blur album I've had so far" and "shut the fuck up Damon Albarn" approximately 30 times.

It's way too long (not helped by the drawling "Oily Water" or disastrous "Miss America" tanking proceedings towards the second third of the album), and it tries to be psuedo-intellectual whilst ultimately coming off as a bit daft. Very Kinks-esque updated for the 90s, but I'm not the biggest Kinks fan, so go figure!

1.64

I definitely enjoyed Parklife more. This one had some great moments, but every song had something that was annoying to me. It’s hard to believe this is the same guy who’d go on to write Demon Days.

This was pretty good. I like it when Blur really leans into their Britpop and Britishness, it gives the album more personality than their later works. Most songs here are fun and upbeat, quite a bit of variety too. Some songs dragged on for a bit too long, they'd be nice at first but then have 3 minutes of nothing tacked onto them. Still a fun album and a good effort.

Damon Albarn sings in a really annoying way. It's like he can't stay in the same octave for a full line. It's not pleasing to the ear.

i apologize blur i was not familiar with your game

I didn't hate this album, but I was a little bit bored. There was nothing that pulled me in.

Song I liked- Turn It Up

Some good stuff here. Some weirdo stuff too that misses the mark a bit. Typical Kinks-worship Brit-pop at times with almost equal attention given to experimentation outside that box as well. Maybe not their best album, but still a fun listen.

Solid but unspectacular. Starts with a bang with ‘For Tomorrow’ and ‘Advert’ but then gets lost for a while and never really recovers. Suffers from the 90s album affliction that one must fill the shiny compact disc with songs, even if some of them aren’t very good. Miss America, I’m looking at you.
Or maybe it’s just that a whole album of Damon putting on that affected accent is tiresome. But that might just be me…..

Would have been improved by surprise hip-hop collaborators

I'd somehow never listened to a full Blur album until now, despite enjoying plenty of their songs and being a fan of Damon Albarn's output in general. Given that this album came before a lot of their more well-known hits, it has a slightly different feel to it than I'd come to associate with Blur, but it's a side of them that I enjoy all the same. I can see how people would consider it less unique and interesting than their later output, but this sort of guitar-driven, melody-focused sound is right up my alley.

Honestly, any album that just gives me lovely melodies to get lost in is going to get a good review from me. Maybe I'm just easily pleased. Miss America in particular, even though it's admittedly quite a sonic departure from the rest of the album, I thought was practically hypnotizing. I could listen to a lot of these tracks for hours.

The hooks are great, the lyrics are charming in their irreverence, and the instrumentation and production are immaculate. It's just a great album from almost start to finish (tracks 4-6 are a bit whatever, but I love the rest). I'm definitely going to check out the rest of their catalogue now.

Favourite tracks: Miss America, Oily Water, Colin Zeal

Better than Oasis, which isn't very hard to do. However, not as good as pulp

Has a few songs that stand out, but otherwise very generic alt pop stuff.

This one flew by me. Not bad, not interesting enough to remember.

Enjoyed the album but not one of my favourites from blur.

People: ‘Blur or Oasis?’
Me: ‘Gorillaz.’

I don't hate this, but I also just don't get the appeal of Blur. In the whole britpop battle of Blur vs. Oasis, consider me totally team Oasis.

And I think I finally figured out my issue with Damon Albarn: when he goes into falsetto, he sounds almost indistinguishable from Spinal Tap's Nigel Tufnel. And now I can't un-hear it.

It was ok...kind of meh to be honest. But not bad, just nothing I would seek out ever again.