After all these years Blur still big
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Hurriyet Daily News
Oluşturulma Tarihi: Aralık 17, 2008 00:00
ISTANBUL - More than a decade after their commercial heyday, Blur continues to be a commanding presence in British music. Tickets for the band's reunion show were sold out in a dazzling two-minutes.
It has been more than a decade since the Blur-Oasis clash rocked the world, but two bands can still make the headlines. The success of the former’s reunion concert proves it.
Within two minutes of going on sale Friday, tickets for British band Blur's reunion concert at London’s Hyde Park next year sold out, organizers said.
It was announced last week that the London band would reunite after five years, being joined by guitarist Graham Coxon, who left the band in 2002 after falling out with fellow band members. Vocalist Damon Albarn, bassist Alex James and drummer Dave Rowntree went on to record their last current record "Think Tank" and then toured as a trio, before going on hiatus.
While Coxon was releasing solo records, Albarn was busy with several side projects, which were completely different in styles. He produced "Gorillaz," a virtual pop band based on cartoon characters, with artist Jamie Hewlett, and took part in "The Good, The Bad And The Queen," an all-star group of musicians from bands The Clash and The Verve. Albarn also recorded "Mali Music," an album devoted to African music with Malian musicians and worked on "Monkey: Journey To The West," a pop-opera inspired by a Chinese legend.
The four-piece group, who had a string of hits in the 1990s, will perform a second 50,000-capacity date July 2 in London's Hyde Park due to the demand for tickets.
Having released many hits, including "Girls And Boys" and "Song 2," while putting out successful records such as "Parklife" and "The Great Escape," Blur was at the forefront of the Britpop guitar music scene in the 1990s and nurtured a very public rivalry with Manchester rock band Oasis. In the summer of 1995, the two bands released their singles, "Country House" and "Some Might Say" on the same day, creating the biggest chart face-off of the 1990s. Blur was the winning side of the duel as "Country House" became number one, while the single by the Gallagher brothers’ band had to settle for second. Thirteen years on, Blur still proves to be a power in the music world today, and its reunion stole the limelight from the reunion of another Brit band, The Verve.
However, for Albarn it is all about themselves, not the hype around them. "It just felt it was right again," Albarn said to English music magazine NME. "It somehow feels like there's something for us to do again. We're not completely useless or pointless. We've got a reason to exist."
Within two minutes of going on sale Friday, tickets for British band Blur's reunion concert at London’s Hyde Park next year sold out, organizers said.
It was announced last week that the London band would reunite after five years, being joined by guitarist Graham Coxon, who left the band in 2002 after falling out with fellow band members. Vocalist Damon Albarn, bassist Alex James and drummer Dave Rowntree went on to record their last current record "Think Tank" and then toured as a trio, before going on hiatus.
While Coxon was releasing solo records, Albarn was busy with several side projects, which were completely different in styles. He produced "Gorillaz," a virtual pop band based on cartoon characters, with artist Jamie Hewlett, and took part in "The Good, The Bad And The Queen," an all-star group of musicians from bands The Clash and The Verve. Albarn also recorded "Mali Music," an album devoted to African music with Malian musicians and worked on "Monkey: Journey To The West," a pop-opera inspired by a Chinese legend.
The four-piece group, who had a string of hits in the 1990s, will perform a second 50,000-capacity date July 2 in London's Hyde Park due to the demand for tickets.
Having released many hits, including "Girls And Boys" and "Song 2," while putting out successful records such as "Parklife" and "The Great Escape," Blur was at the forefront of the Britpop guitar music scene in the 1990s and nurtured a very public rivalry with Manchester rock band Oasis. In the summer of 1995, the two bands released their singles, "Country House" and "Some Might Say" on the same day, creating the biggest chart face-off of the 1990s. Blur was the winning side of the duel as "Country House" became number one, while the single by the Gallagher brothers’ band had to settle for second. Thirteen years on, Blur still proves to be a power in the music world today, and its reunion stole the limelight from the reunion of another Brit band, The Verve.
However, for Albarn it is all about themselves, not the hype around them. "It just felt it was right again," Albarn said to English music magazine NME. "It somehow feels like there's something for us to do again. We're not completely useless or pointless. We've got a reason to exist."