Blur – The Magic Whip

2023 double album from stalwarts of Britpop

 

The Magic Whip is the first Blur album since 2003’s Think Tank, the first with guitarist Graham Coxon onboard since 1999’s 13 (Coxon was booted from the Think Tank sessions a week in and summarily quit), and the first with producer Stephen Street since 1997’s Blur. Like Albarn’s recent solo work, it explores the distant traveler’s conflicting sense of wonder and alienation.

 

Blur’s always been puckish in spirit, its greatest gift the identification and gleeful subversion of listener expectations, and in moments like these it re-emerges, untarnished by the passage of time.

 

A1 – Lonesome Street – 4:23

A2 – New World Towers – 4:02

A3 – Go Out – 4:40

B1 – Ice Cream Man – 3:23

B2 – Thought I Was A Spaceman – 6:16

B3 – I Broadcast – 2:52

C1 – My Terracotta Heart – 4:05

C2 – There Are Too Many Of Us – 4:26

C3 – Ghost Ship – 4:59

D1 – Pyongyang – 5:38

D2 – Ong Ong – 3:06

D3 – Mirrorball – 3:37