Photo by Reuben Bastienne-Lewis

blur don’t need to reinvent themselves at this late stage in their post-reunion era, but at the risk of sounding boring, they can’t help themselves from giving it a try on “St. Charles Square”. The second single from the Brit-pop luminaries forthcoming 9th studio album, The Ballad of Darren, is very much howling to a demographic of a certain age in niche alternative where zonked out guitars and malady hand-in-hand with Damon Albarn’s fixation on the existential doldrums is its own kind of rage. “But we might not get back to ourselves at all / No Tesco disco / The room is shrinking fast around me,” he admits into Graham Coxon’s electric squalor and the turvy stammer of drummer David Rountree and bassist Alex James. “Loneliness I’ve been here before / ‘Cause every generation has its gilded poseur.” Certainly never them, as their history of lusting for life repeats itself time and time again…

Directed by: Toby L

blur’s The Ballad of Darren will be released July 21st on Parlophone.