History Main / Blur

* ConceptAlbum: ''The Great Escape'': Empty existences for everyone.
** Specifically the empty existences of so-called "well-off" folks.

* NonAppearingTitle: Anything with the word "Song" in it and pretty much nothing else.

* TruckDriversGearChange: B.L.U.R.E.M.I.
* VindicatedByHistory: ''especially'' in America, their critical stature increased as years went by. By the end of the 90's, Many of the same American publications who negatively reviewed their earlier work were now putting records like ''Modern Life is Rubbish'' and ''Parklife'' into their Best Albums of the Decade lists.

* TheyChangedItNowItSucks: Notably averted; their [[GenreShift Genre Shifts]] were mostly well-received.

* TheWoobie: The carton of milk from Coffee and TV.

* {{Mondegreen}}: The folks making RockBand misheard the LoopedLyrics at the end of "Beetlebum" as "He's on it". It's actually "Piss on it," arguably stranger than the mondegreen version. (Or could be a case of {{Bowdlerization}}.)

* MisaimedFandom: No surprise, since band was irony at its fullest, but some people have problem to notice that.

* FunnyAneurysmMoment: In the 1999 video for "Coffee & TV" - perhaps the band's [[MusicVideoOvershadowing most famous video]] - The man missing on the back of the milk carton is played by the band's guitarist Graham Coxon. By the time of the 2003 release of their next album, ''Think Tank'', he ''was'' missing from Blur, having quit the band a few years earlier in acrimony.

* EarWorm: WOO-HOO.
** Being a pop group, they have a lot of these.
** "Girls and Boys" is the most catchy after the aforementioned "Song 2".

* AmericansHateTingle: Along with Britpop in general, why their pre-''Blur'' (the 4th album) material wasn't well recognized or accepted in the States by anyone who wasn't a music critic.

* {{Mondegreen}}: The folks making RockBand misheard the LoopedLyrics at the end of Beetlebum as "He's on it". It's actually "Piss on it," arguably stranger than the mondegreen version. (Or could be a case of {{Bowdlerization}}.)

* LoveSong: "Girls and Boys".

* HoYay: The boys kiss on stage. And grope one another. And some sources have indicated that Alex and Damon have kissed each other... [[IfYouKnowWhatIMean down there.]] YaoiFangirls rejoice.

* HoYay: So much Ho Yay.

* AccentUponTheWrongSyllable: For instance, Song 2's refrain (it has more lyrics than "'''[[SomethingSomethingLeonardBernstein WOO-HOO]]'''") goes "When I feel heavy meTAL / And I'm pins and needLES".

* AccentUponTheWrongSyllable: For instance, Song 2's refrain (it has more lyrics than '''[[SomethingSomethingLeonardBernstein WOO-HOO]]''') goes "When I feel heavy meTAL / And I'm pins and needLES".

* AccentUponTheWrongSyllable: For instance, Song 2's refrain (it has more lyrics than [[SomethingSomethingLeonardBernstein WOO-HOO]]) goes "When I feel heavy meTAL / And I'm pins and needLES".

* AmericansHateTingle: Along with Britpop in general, why their pre-''Blur'' material wasn't well recognized or accepted in the States by anyone who wasn't a music critic.

* CreatorBacklash: in later years Albarn would disown ''The Great Escape'' for being artifical and slick, and the band are especially unkind about the big brass-band knees up "Country House" (their first number one).

Debuted on the Shoegazing scene as Seymour before signing to Food Records under the condition that they change their name to Blur (and, according to fan legend, that drummer Dave Rowntree stop wearing pyjama pants on stage). Soon after released their first album ''Leisure'' to moderate success, followed by the [[BritPop very British]] "[[TropeMaker Popscene]]" single and a tour of America [[AmericansHateTingle to predictable results]]. Achieved great success with ''Parklife'' a couple of years later, did SomethingCompletelyDifferent every couple of albums later until eventually dissolving after [[TheBandMinusTheFace Think Tank]] sometime around 2004. The original lineup, with Graham Coxon in tow, reunited in 2009 to [[{{Understatement}} much anticipation]] and released a new song, "Fool's Day" in the Spring of 2010

* AlbumTitleDrop: "For Tomorrow" of ''Modern Life Is Rubbish''

** Bassist Alex James admitted to spending £1,000,000 on cocaine during the band's mid-90's heyday, a decision he regretted after becoming clean. After Blur broke up and he became a cheesemaker and journalist, James went on assignment for the BBC to Columbia for the 2008 TV documentary ''[[http://www.bbcamerica.com/content/292/cocaine-diaries-alex-james-in-columbia.jsp Cocaine Dairies: Alex James in Columbia]]'', [[SomeAnvilsNeedToBeDropped about the horrors of the Columbian cocaine trade]].

* DarkerAndEdgier: Their first few albums (ie, "Parklife"), were bright and bubbly, with "Parklife" being ComedyRock. But their albums gradually got darker and melancholy as their sound progressed, with the subject matter of "13" mainly being that of a break up, and "Think Tank" having a very eerie and somber feel to it.

* FunnyAneurysmMoment: In the 1999 video for "Coffee & TV" - perhaps the band's [[MusicVideoOvershadowing most famous video]] - The man missing on the back of the milk carton is played by the band's guitarist Graham Coxon. by the time of the 2003 release of ''Think Tank'', he ''was'' missing from Blur, having quit the band a few years earlier in acrimony (and only contributing one song, "Battery in Your Leg" to ''Think Tank'', which he made with no other members present).

* ExecutiveMeddling: One of the good examples. The band's label disliked their second album that they asked them to go back and start over again. Then when the band delivered that album to their label, the label claimed that it needed two more single-worthy songs. The album that resulted, ''Modern Life is Rubbish'', is considered one of the band's best albums. The two "singleworthy" songs, "For Tomorrow" and "Chemical World" were two of the band's biggest (at the time) and most popular songs. The already recorded first-try album was instead released as b-sides to the three singles from the new second-try (the third single being "Sunday Sunday"). those now-B-sides are decent, but are not considered to be stronger than the material on ''Modern Life is Rubbish''.

** Bassist Alex James admitted to spending £1,000,000 on cocaine during the band's mid-90's heyday, a decision he regretted after becoming clean. After Blur broke up and he became a journalist/cheese-maker, James went on assignment for the BBC to Columbia for the 2008 TV documentary ''[[http://www.bbcamerica.com/content/292/cocaine-diaries-alex-james-in-columbia.jsp Cocaine Dairies: Alex James in Columbia]]'', [[SomeAnvilsNeedToBeDropped about the horrors of the Columbian cocaine trade]].