The Good, The Bad and The Queen - The Roundhouse
The Good, The Bad & The Queen was the world premiere of a new album from Blur/Gorillaz main-man Damon Albarn. It’s all a bit strange, but seemingly the band is nameless, so the night was named after the album – which the played in its entirety, in order – but the album won’t actually be released until January 2007.
The pre-show publicity has also talked The Good, The Bad & The Queen up as a kind of cross-generational supergroup featuring Albarn, Paul Simonon of The Clash on bass, guitarist Simon Tong of The Verve and Gorillaz, and Fela Kuti drummer Tony Allen.
That said – it was fairly apparent from the way Albarn called the shots on the stage (including getting the band to re-start ‘Kingdom Of Doom’ and ‘Three Changes’ because he wasn’t happy with how they were being performed) and the flavor of the new material – that this was very much his project, with the others invited along as special guests.
The material is all themed around London – again in some of the pre-show interviews Albarn has gone so far as to describe it as a sequel to Blur’s seminal “Parklife” album.
Musically it falls somewhere between The Gorillaz and Blur – following the mash-up composition style of the former, but utilizing more tradition rock instrumentation of guitar, bass, drums and piano/keyboard of the latter.
Highlights for me where the menacing ‘Kingdom of Doom’ (Albarn seemed particularly fiery after having to re-start the song again), and the ballads ‘Behind The Sun’ (dedicated to the late, great John Peel) and ‘Greenfields’.
After spending much of The Gorillaz live shows silhouetted on keyboards in the back, Albarn also seemed to be relishing the opportunity to be out-front of a band again – “it’s good to be back” he commented at one point. Hopefully a good sign for anyone who, like me, is anxiously awaiting a new Blur record and tour.
<< Home