Back in the day, Lennon recording and releasing a song in a weekm as he did with "Instant Karma", today it is the rule of thumb. Any downtown is self-inflicted, and so two days after Blur played their post-haste post-Olympics Hyde Park (Life), here comes the album: Parklife (Live) and here is my review.
You had to be there.
Lead singer Damon Albarn is an excitable lad on stage and he is nearly jumping out of his skin here, and the audience is singing at the top of its lungs, but what do you and I care?
Here are the first five songs on the live double:
Girls And Boys
London Love
Tracy Jacks
Jubilee
Beetlebum
In other words, four songs off their big hit and a later single. What do I need those for? Because these versions are better than the versions of the 2009 Live double from Hyde Park? Or even the originals?
After that they zig zag from deep album cuts and beloved faves at a high energy high octane full throated powerdrive. Only lifted for Damon's inane patter about how magical the Olympics were and how nice it was to see TV without commercials. I still hate "Under The Westway" and this version does nothing to improve my opinion ("It;s you song!" he claims, good then give me the royalties), and it is followed by one of their greatest moments of all "End Of The Century". Except, the first sucks and the second is all about Damon's subtle vocal, completely lost here of course. Sure, "your mind gets dirty as you get closer to 5o" is a funny little bit of self-deprecation but that's all it is.
They leave the title track, featuring Phil Daniels (the kid in the movie of Quadrophenia and the original lead singer) and it is undoubtedly the only moment when the album goes flying off the handle. And the only song you actually need.
Look at it this way: Rubbish is a masterpiece, PL is a close second, and it is downhill without a break from there. Sure there are sings, lots of songs, but really, the Kinks they ain't. It is like the Kinks for people with no sense of history whatsoever.
is this the end of Blur? Looks that way, and no trip to nyc the dicks. I would love to see Blur live one more time, love to have caught em at Hyde Park if I had a press pass. But as a live sampler? It is not a good album.
Grade: B-