Author: Dollyrocker
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For those of you who don't remember, April 1994 was a total musical wasteground. In all honesty, it had been coming for some time, the number of truly great new bands that had started up in that decade had so far only amounted to Suede, Manic Street Preachers, Saint Etienne, The Charlatans and Blur. All of these were British, as the american explosion of grunge had actually been carried over from the 80's, and other leaders of the indie scene like Pulp, Jesus & Mary Chain and My Bloody Valentine had all been around long enough to have legally driven a sinclair C5.
Blurs output in the early 90's had gone pretty much from fair to middling; 'Leisure' was their 1991 debut LP, whose most redeeming feature was probably the cover artwork and 1993's 'Modern Life Is Rubbish' had some great tracks on it, the anthemic 'Sunday, Sunday' and 'For Tomorrow' both being GREAT singles, but as an LP it was hardly going to set the world alight.
I think there was only about a month or so between the suicide of Nirvana's Kurt Cobain and the release of 'Parklife' and I think that musically, and indeed socially, Blurs third LP marked a new beginning and a very exciting feeling as that summer began - the entire feel of the UK indie scene felt like it had been given a massive lift. There were a few other bands doing fairly well at the time, Elastica, Gene, Shed 7 and These Animal Men were making pretty heavy impressions on the 15 and 16 year olds at the time, but it was Blur, a little like Franz Ferdinand today, who stood out from the pack, with the unusual combination of songs, style, variety, intelligence and fun in pretty much everything they did.
The LP opens with 'Girls & Boys', which managed to unite clubbers, gays, indie kids, house heads, even a few die hard new romantics together, with their tongue-in-cheek ode to UK holidaymakers. The track still stands up very well today, when Erol played it out at one of the early Bodyrockers in 2002, it got as big a cheer as Miss Kitten, Dave Clarke, Moreplay and all the rest for sure. The band asked Pet Shop Boys to remix the track, which was a massively unusual thing for an indie band to do back then, with Ride and the like remaining firmly stuck in their wooly jumpers and Byrds LP's type vibe. 'Tracy Jacks' opens with one of Grahams 'Who' like power chords and has some really nice vocal harmonies as well. 'End Of The Century' is probably (in my opinion) one of the best songs of the 90's and was also the final single to be released of the LP. The song used to close Blur's live gigs at the time and has a really euphoric 'end of night' sort of vibe to it. 'Parklife', the title track features 'Quadrophenia's Phil Daniel with a running commentary on his fantasy day to day life. The whole LP has a very British theme to it, as shown on 'Bank Holiday', a one minute forty second punk type song dedicated to the UK bank holidays. "Bank holiday comes six times a year, Days of enjoyment to which everyone cheers, Bank holiday comes with a six pack of beer...then its back to work a.g.a.i.n."
'Badhead' is a beautiful song with Damon singing about the sadness of losing contact with friends and how people drift apart. There are some nice Roland horns on the chorus too, as Blur had clearly pushed themselves forward since 'Modern Life...'. Better production too. 'The Debt Collector' is an instrumental ditty, with a fairground/circus sort of vibe to it. 'Far Out' is a very short, dreamy Alex composition, and he sings on it too. To say that this track owes a lot to Pink Floyds Syd Barrett would be something of an understatement.
Side two kicks off with the lovely 'To The End', which is a kitsch, retro song with backing vocals sung on French by Laetitia Sadier. This was also a single off the LP, although a rather unusual single choice I think. 'London Loves' is London life through Damons eyes; "London loves - The way people just fall apart, London loves - The way you just don't stand a chance, London loves - The mystery of a speeding car". 'Trouble In The Message Centre' is the band back in XTC post punk mode, and this track is another conceptual story of being a manager in a mediocre environment. 'Clover Over Dover' is another lovely gentle song with some beautiful lyrics; "If that is the fact, Then in actual fact, I'm not where it's at and it's over." 'Magic America' is a track dedicated to America, presumably based on Blurs ill fated 1993 tour over there, which is where a lot of the ideas for 'Parklife' were spawned. 'Jubilee' is a track that I think should have been a single. Bizarrely, they did in fact perform the track live in 'Top Of The Pops' at the time, but was not released as a single. It tells a story of a teenage outcast unable to deal with day to day socialising. 'This Is A Low' is the LP's final proper track, and is by far the most beautiful in the LP. An ode to British life, it has some lovely guitar work and nice hammond in the chorus. The LP ends with 'Lot 105', a cheeky little ditty in a Blackpool pier stylee.
In short, no review could do this LP justice and mine has definitely not done so. No LP since 'Parklife' has had such a HUGE impact on the way that a generation thinks, the music they listen to, the clothes they wear, to date Blur remain completely untouched.
Surprisingly, I had never actually seen Soulwax live before this gig, but had followed them around when they started out as 2manydjs, their dj side project which focused on mashing up electro, pop music and the odd bit of rock to dancefloor tearing effect. Soulwax were third down bill to Babyshambles and Kasabian at the final leg of the four day wireless festival and to be honest, with no disrespect to the organisers, the atmosphere when I arrived at about 6pm was pretty dead. However, huge tense rainclouds hovering over Hyde Park may well have been a factor, more about them later. I had been lucky enough to score some free tickets for this gig, so after meeting my friend and getting some drinks, it was just a case of waiting for Soulwax to come on at 6.30pm. Originally, I had got confused and thought that they were playing in the smaller xfm tent, but they actually were out on the outdoor main stage which was much better for a band with a sound as immense as Soulwax's. 
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