Damon Albarn: Blur, Gorillaz & Other Fables

by Martin Roach, David Nolan

The creator of Britpop, the face of Blur and the man who picked the biggest fight in rock history with his battle with Oasis, Damon Albarn has survived the 1990s with his credibility intact and his desire to succeed undiminished.

Blur, Gorillaz & Other Fables covers his multiple musical personae in depth, with first-hand interviews by those close to Albarn in his formative years, as well as social and musical context that covers the Britpop era and Albarn's re-emergence as the Godfather to the iPod generation.

From Mockney pin-up to Monkey the opera...Britpop wars to World Music...Gorillaz to The Good, the Bad and the Queen...authors Martin Roach and David Nolan chart the life and times of one of music's most challenging artists.

Genres: Music, Nonfiction, Biography, Art

224 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2007

Reviews

[Tom Boniface-Webb · Rating 4 out of 5]

What a career! The story of the modern day renaissance man. “I get angry with myself if I’m just sitting watching TV!”

Few mistakes I spotted though, probably just something a super fan nerd like me would notice though.

[Kat Noble · Rating 3 out of 5]

It was interesting to have the context of the 1990s UK music scene, having grown up listening to this music but being too young to remember the events truly and to realise what impact the band had on the music industry and how much their sound changed and grew with each record. #

The biography is thorough, with a variety of interviews and information. Damon Albarn emerges as a driven and interesting creator, albeit with a prickly and sometimes overconfident belief in his work, which is usually justified in the end. His energy and craftsmanship is relentless. He is involved in many creative processes and innovates his music throughout his career, not wanting to stand still, but to grow in ways I was unaware of before reading.

I knew of Blur and Gorillaz, but I did not know about his work with African musicians and World Music, his operas, film soundtracks and his later collaborations for The Good, the Bad and the Queen with Flea from the Red Hot Chilli Peppers and Paul Simonon from The Clash.

It is good reading for the history of the UK music scene in the 1990s, with the different bands that embraced Britannia, New Wave on New Wave, and saw their moment in the sun or became legends.

It illustrates a breadth of impressions about their work and highlights their inspirations from the previous generations of musicians. I got to discover more about the band and their road to success and what it takes to stay at the top and I came to have a new appreciation of the songs I already knew and the creative process for making music.

[Lauren · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm a fan of Blur so I've read a few books on the band. On the whole the book was insightful and interesting, I particularly enjoyed the sections on The Good, The Bad and The Queen, Damon's opera work and the Everyday Robots album. The content on Blur and Gorillaz has been done before in other books and so if you've already read other books you won't find anything new here. The sections on Damon's early years and the impact his drama background has upon his performances was interesting but large chunks of the Blur and Gorillaz sections were just descriptions of album tracks (which if you're reading this book you're most likely a fan and already know them well) and lists of tour dates with descriptions of the tours. I find this kind of content quite boring, like when reading NME reviews of gigs, one is ok but after a few it starts to get dull.

Maybe if I wasn't already familiar with the Blur and Gorillaz back catalogue it would have been more interesting. I also think it suffered in parts because it lacked any input from Damon or those close to him. At the beginning of the book there are acknowledgements to people 'close' to Damon for their contributions but their input appeared to stop after the first few chapters. It misses the detail of input from either the man himself or those truely close to him. I'd recommend this book to fans as there were some interesting parts but ultimately there's nothing new to be read here.

[Lisa-Jaine · Rating 2 out of 5]

I can overlook a certain amount of typos and spelling errors but I'm afraid this book lost a star by its constant referral to Parklife as Blur's 4th CD. This book didn't grab me it felt almost like a recital of the facts and any warmth or humour was sadly lacking.

[ᴛʜᴇᴏᴅᴏʀᴇ · Rating 2 out of 5]

After the noughties hit, it's little more than an overview of Damon Albarn's discography, and it is rife with spelling mistakes, and there is not nearly enough Graham Coxon. But it wasn't altogether unenjoyable.

[Amy · Rating 1 out of 5]

Obsessed with the subject but man this was sloppily written

[Delia · Rating 3 out of 5]

I expected more Oasis beef. Some lines made me question whether the author likes him in the first place

[megan · Rating 4 out of 5]

knew everything already but it added interesting details i hadn’t heard before, damon is a musical genius but don’t tell him that

[Joanna · Rating 1 out of 5]

This book is 1/2 old information (actually taken nearly word for word from Martin Roach's earlier biography on Blur), and 1/2 new drivel. It even manages to get some facts wrong! Disappointing biography on a fascinating man. Only published because there wasn't a biography on him already, probably. A rush job. Sad. I do recommend Martin Roach's Blur: The Whole Story. It's the first half of this book, plus pictures. Much, much better.

[Anne-Sophie · Rating 3 out of 5]

I thought the updated e-book edition of the book I read back at the time of its first publication would have corrected some mistakes as calling Parklife the fourth blur album (twice!) for exemple, but no... Not a bad book per se, however too many little mistakes which could have been avoided.
Furthermore, the update only consists of covering 2009-present day in a small chapter, slight disappointment.

[Isobel · Rating 2 out of 5]

As a massive blur/Damon Albarn fan, I expected to thoroughly enjoy this book. However, I was slightly disappointed. The book certainly is informative, yet lacks entertainment. As a large fan, most of the information was already known to me making it a fairly uninteresting read. It lacked interest through out.

[Luke Benjamin · Rating 2 out of 5]

A man so interesting, charismatic and singular in his field deserved a better analysis than this. This feels like a compilation of magazine interviews already published. Instead of reading this, just read some interviews and watch some videos.