release date: Apr. 25, 1994
format: digital (1999 reissue)
[album rate: 4 / 5] [3,76]
producer: Stephen Street
label: Food Records / EMI Japan - nationality: England, UK
Track highlights: 1. "Girls & Boys" - 2. "Tracy Jacks" - 3. "End of a Century" (4 / 5) (live) - 4. "Parklife" - 9. "To the End" - 13. "Magic America"
3rd studio album by Blur following the one-year old Modern Life Is Rubbish is like that again produced by Stephen Street.
The album continues the style of britpop with lyrics about everyday-life and a music building on a mix of pop / rock and mod traditions with a few exceptions proving the band was always experimenting with musical styles - something that later on would be much more clear, when thinking of the band's later albums and the various projects of front-man Damon Albarn.
I didn't like much of the britpop at the time except for Suede, and the much talked about duel Oasis vs. Blur was just another obscure pop thing that I didn't involve in. In retrospect, I have made an easy and clear choice about the two bands, and I literally find it hard not to come to the obvious conclusion that of those two, Blur was the only band worthwhile, and with Parklife they truly deserved a considerable spot among the all-time greatest British music artists.
As the band's first, the album topped the national albums charts, it was nominated the Mercury Prize, it won Best British Album at the 1995 Brit Awards, and it's enlisted in "1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die".
[ allmusic.com 5 / 5, NME 4,5 / 5, Rolling Stone, Q Magazine 4 / 5 stars ]
