Idolator

I don't find it the most ludicrous claim insofar as the fact that Damon transforms his sound for each record, particularly back in the Blur days. I'm not saying he's close to Bowie in terms of song quality necessarily, but he definitely has the same M.O. as Bowie in the way he approaches making an album.

@Lucas Jensen: Stop it! You're only encouraging him.

Yeah, I'm going to have to also say this isn't that questionable of a comparison.

I could see how with all of the 50 Cent / Brad Paisley attention going on at Idolator right now it can be hard to get perspective on blur/bowie.

-nt-

Improper perspectives are being encouraged here. Instead I ask us to realize anyone continuing this 'Damon is the new Bowie' talk is encouraging Damon to eventually wear tights and a huge mullet while dancing with trolls, then later wear lime green suits and the world's worst goatee. In between he will order Jesus to be crucified. Is this a positive development or not, though?

Is being SICK IN THE HEAD a requirement for writing about music in the Guardian? I think so.

Wait a minute, I thought Noel Gallagher was the new John Lennon.

OH HOW THE MIGHTY HAVE FALLEN.

Seriously, guys. Blur put out some amazing records in their day. They have an impressive batch of singles if nothing else. I mean, Bowie has Tin Machine's I and II. And a little piece of conceptual trash called Outside (oh, that we never found out the end story of the art-murder of dear Baby Grace). Nothing in Albarn's catalog matches those atrocities.

Nothing in Albarn's catalog matches those atrocities.

HAHAHAAHAHAAHA.

Let us agree to disagree.

Ok, so now David Bowie's artistic legacy can be summed up in "he had a lot of influences" and "he liked to change sounds between albums".

Nevermind his exploration of identity (public, personal, sexual), and his willingness to change his appearance into the most ridiculous outfits to serve this exploration. Oh, and the groundbreaking music videos.

But yeah, Damon had Gorillaz, and that's about the same, right?

@Ned Raggett: Name one Blur record as bad as Tin Machine or Buddha of Suburbia. Certainly Blur never touched any of Bowie's 70s output. I'm just saying it's not the most outlandish thing I've ever heard. Christ. It's certainly not James Blunt is the new John Lennon. And I liked Demon Days quite a bit so fuck all ya'll.

@MJ: I'm not saying Bowie sucks at all. I think he and Eno are probably the two most important rock artists of the 70s. And I'm not disagreeing with you about his searching for identity, etc. But the genre-jumping has always been Bowie's double-edged sword. He's a dilettante in the best possible way, but it does smack of faddism from time to time and that's probably the biggest knock against, particularly starting with Let's Dance and going forward.

Damon Albarn, whether you like him or not, is not exactly some untalented Robbie Williams type who shits out pop records. Gorillaz, while cursed with a bad name and questionable aesthetics, did bring together some pretty disparate artists to put out fairly strange commercial records. For Pete's sake, can nobody be compared to St. Bowie?

@Lucas Jensen: I understand, and I mostly agree with you. I know David Bowie is not some sort of paragon of musical perfection and wise and honest career choices. And I really like Damon Albarn and what he's done with Gorillaz.

I still think that the concept of the article doesn't hold up well to scrutiny, because Bowie has a couple more dimensions as an artist than Damon Albarn, and he's taken more risks with them too (sometimes failing spectacularly).

I don't think is an outrageous comparison, but by the time the writer was finished writing the article he should have realized that he was being less than thorough, and that it was all rather irrelevant.

@Lucas Jensen: Blur has done a lot of great stuff - Modern Life Is Rubbish is one of my favorite records. But, like any artist with a sizeable body of work, he's released some real crap, too ("Country House" is on par with any of Bowie's most embarrassing stuff).

My initial "What?!?!" reaction to this stems more from Bowie and Albarn as personalities. I think Bowie has lived his time in the spotlight with a certain inscrutable and charming quality. Albarn, however, seems contemptuous towards his fans. You can't release an album like Parklife and then get upset when teenagers show up at your shows. His dalliances with African music and hip hop, while successful to different degrees, seemed more like attempts to escape the stigma of Britpop than serious creative steps. Any more of that and we could have another Sting on our hands.