ALBUM REVIEW: Blur - Leisure

    Is it much of a stretch to say that Blur's first album is the result of a little bit of luck? That isn't to say that the group had no talent or formed out of midair - Alex James joined Damon Albarn's band Circus back in 1988, just before the emergence of the Madchester and baggy musical movements in the wake of the Stone Roses' lightning-hot debut album from 1989. After getting picked up by Food Records in November of that year, the group underwent a name change from "Seymour" to the name that we know and love them by nowadays - two singles later, and whaddayaknow? They've got themselves a Top 10 hit with "There's No Other Way", a song that certifiably fits them into the baggy musical movement - gotta make an album now, I guess! From what little information exists, the album's recording process wasn't exactly easy, as Food wanted Blur to latch onto what remained of the baggy trend, meanwhile Blur didn't want to lose the aspects of their original group image - it probably didn't help that lead songwriter Damon Albarn had a habit of writing the lyrics in the studio. Ultimately, the label's desire to keep the baggy sound that gave them success was the very same thing that drove Leisure to its knees. While very little of Blur's first album is an outwardly bad affair, much of it plays pretty passe, with only a handful of moments leaving a major impression. While it was the commercial success that the label had hoped for, it ultimately didn't help in the long run - by 1992, Blur were shedding their baggy image, wearing a new sound, and had all but forgotten what some have called a false starter of a debut.

    While Leisure isn't a complete failure, its biggest weakness is ultimately in the sometimes slapdash nature of the songs - given that the label was demanding a certain sound, and the fact that many of the lyrics were written while recording, this shouldn't necessarily be a surprise, but it doesn't mitigate this issue. Even on the sharpest moments from the album such as the strong opening track "She's So High", Damon Albarn's lyrics sometimes leave much to be desired - they don't say much, and they lack an irony and wit that's much more apparent on the group's later work. While some of the songs certainly feel more realized than others on this lyrical level, such as their chart-topping "There's No Other Way", some are flat-out simplistic mantras that leave little to the imagination - "Sing" is not only a non-starter of a song, but its lyrical contents is similarly D.O.A., and strangely enough this is one of the album's more beloved tracks (probably has to do with it featuring in the film Trainspotting). Plenty of the other tracks have a similarly rushed feeling in this way, such as "Come Together" or "Slow Down", two songs that also segment brilliantly into my second point: a good chunk of this album is very repetitive in its sound. As you may recall, Blur was already running out of ideas in this baggy field, and you can certainly hear it in this record, where some songs ebb and flow together to the point where identifying the differences between "High Cool" and "Bad Day" may prove difficult if you aren't paying attention - did the CD skip? No, you are in fact on a different song, dear reader. These two factors coalesce into an album that, while not an absolute chore to get through, proves a very unexciting listen for a good chunk of the 50-minute runtime.

    With that being said, there's plenty of aspects of the album that help make those 50 minutes at least a little worthwhile. The first of these things, also known as "the album's singles", are certainly the strongest points of the album. There's the previously mentioned "She's So High" and "There's No Other Way", two solid rock numbers with some great hooks and more energy than most of the album. There's also the cranked out single "Bang", cranked out in 15 minutes for the label to have another song in the baggy style, and a decent example of how artists really do work best under serious time crunches - it may not necessarily be the album's best song, but damn is that a great chorus. The band, for what it's worth, also sounds great, which helps makes the a pleasant listen at least; Albarn is a solid vocalist, and guitarist Graham Coxon is really doing plenty of heavy lifting, with his creative playing probably being the single strongest element of the whole affair as he churns out interesting licks and ideas. Albarn's songwriting also shines on this album in some ways, mainly in his ear for melody - even on weak moments like the goofy sounding "Bad Day", Albarn can give a pretty solid hook, and it's even better when the songs themselves have the weight to hold themselves up, like on the solid enough cut "Fool". There's also some moments of weirdness and psychedelia, such as on the penultimate track "Birthday" or the overdriven power of the closing track "Wear Me Down", which helps to break up some of the monotony of the album. It's these moments that help to pick the album up from its general same-y nature and rushed feeling, and they help showcase this early incarnation of Blur at their best.

    Still, this album was just not meant to be for Blur - while it did well on the charts, critics were quick to leave reservations on the group, with some calling the album an "anti-climax". Not long after the album, Blur were getting serious backlash from the music press, made all the worse by an unsuccessful US tour and poorly received shows in the UK - by the start of 1992, Blur had learned that they were £60,000 in debt from mismanagement and were at threat of being dropped from Food Records - during this chaotic fall-out for the group, Albarn (and the group by proxy) dropped the baggy style, pivoted towards very British sounding music with the single "Popscene". Today, "Popscene" is hailed as a pivotal moment for Britpop, but at the time it could only manage 32 on the UK charts; guitarist Graham Coxon later stated that the popularity of grunge was the reason for the song's failure, even stating that "it was Nirvana that really fucked 'Popscene' up". The resulting image switch, critical acclaim, and chart success eventually lead to Leisure being nearly all but forgotten about, and Damon Albarn himself calls it one of two albums from Blur that were "bad". From my experience, Leisure isn't necessarily bad as much as it is half-assed; plenty of moments on this album prove to have at least a little worth, but taken as a whole it plays like record label demands stifling creativity. I don't blame the music press for their vitriolic reactions after the popularity of the singles, especially when the group would go on to much greater moments in the wake of this album. Leisure is an interesting oddity with some fun songs at its best, and at its worse it's a dud of a debut, and one that serves to make their second album the de-facto starting point.

RATING: ✯✯✯✯✯✯✯✯✯✯

Listen to Leisure.