Blur: 'Like walking into 10 years ago'
Updated on 11 June 2009
Stephanie West talks to the members of Blur ahead of their first reunion concert this weekend at a tiny railway station in Colchester.
The band first performed at the East Anglian Railway Museum (capacity 150) in 1988, and they are revisitng the venue this month for a warm-up gig ahead of a series of summer dates leading to them headlining Glastonbury.
Guitarist Graham Coxon left the band seven years ago, but last year he and singer Damon Albarn met and talked, and Blur decided it was time to play together again.
Each venue in their short tour will have special significance. After Colchester, where Coxon, Albarn and drummer Dave Rowntree went to school, they play Goldsmiths, the art college where they all studied.
Then they go to Wolverhampton, where they played the first concert they ever made a profit on.
Graham Coxon on the re-formed band's first rehearsal -
“The first (rehearsal) was fun. I got here… I poked my head round the door and Dave’s drums was there and my amp was sitting next to it and Alex’s bass… It was a nice feeling to see all those instruments together.”
Alex James on the same -
“It was just like walking into 10 years ago. Because we’ve played everything we’ve ever done… some of those songs we haven’t played since we were 22.”
Damon Albarn on performing the band's old songs -
“Some of them definitely haven’t improved. Some sound really interesting.”
Damon Albarn on Blur's first-ever gig, in Wolverhampton -
“We played Dudley JBs. I don’t think any of us will ever forget it because it was the first time any of us ever drove back to London with some money.”
Graham Coxon on Wolverhampton -
“It was a mini psychedelic movement, really, with a kind of indie dance thing. I think they were just really into that up there. They had all the haircuts… some of them looked like their had medieval haircuts.”
Alex James on the same -
“The Midlands was a different country, really.”
Alex James on the experience of playing with Blur -
“It’s very liberating just to play loud music. There’s nothing quite so liberating.”
Graham Coxon on rehearsals -
“We’re doing it quite randomly. We’re chucking in a couple of tricky ones, then giving us a treat by playing a couple of ones that are easier.”
Dave Rowntree on preparing for Blur's upcoming gigs -
“I’ve been running round the park on Tuesday mornings… I’ve been studying law – and it’s weird. I find the muscles that have atrophied the most with me are my writing muscles… I haven’t written anything for 25-30 years. I’ve typed everything.”
