Damon Albarn, Gorillaz co-founder and seemingly part-time Blur frontman, has told Rolling Stone that the long-awaited new Blur album will be ready by May. Albarn has met with Blur-buddies Graham Coxon, Alex James and Dave Rowntree periodically over the past six months to work on the album, hammering out a number of tracks for the bandís seventh release. In speaking about the record, Albarn called the new material, “the most radical things weíve ever done. I think it sort of sounds a bit more like Can meets Led Zeppelin.” German avant-garde rockers combined with the godfathers of metal ñ wow, that does sound like it’s just a touch on the radical side.
Fatboy Slim was reportedly going to be tapped to produce the as-yet-untitled new album, but it now appears as if he will have a more limited role. Albarn most recently commented that Fatboy would be asked to work on a couple of songs towards the end of the recording process. He said, “At the end of a recording period I do like to get someone in to see if they can help make it better, but we don’t really have ëproducersí anymore. The days where someone held our hand through the entire process are long gone.” This would have been the first time the Hawaiian shirt-wearing DJ would have properly produced a band, but sadly weíll have to keep waiting for that glorious day to come.
As previously mentioned, Albarn expects to have the album finished up by May, however, he doesnít want to release it until early 2003. With a Gorillaz movie in the works and an upcoming benefit album for Oxfam entitled Mali Music, it appears that Damon will have his hands full for quite some time.
