by Tan Copsey
Time for a slightly different angle on our great Britannia Redux debate. It seemed necessary and appropriate to aurally augment this debate and in the process take it beyond the confines of the chin-stroking, elderly, and rich. Yes the kids have something to say. We are not entirely sure what it is, and our solipsistic tendencies are there for the world to see, but so what? This is modern Britain. This is the future. Run and hide. It’s a happy coincidence that Bloc Party and The Good, The Bad, and The Queen, have just released albums with an obvious aside in attempting to define the state of the nation. Rather nicely timed to sync with our joint debate with The Economist.
TGTBTQ have a more historically grounded claim to take stock – after all they are a supergroup comprised of members of bands who have done it all before. The Clash, The Verve, and Blur have all produced music of a moment. London Calling, Urban Hymns, and Parklife all have real claims to aurally encapsulating the state of the nation, feeding-back a representative balance of worry, anger, politics, drugs, with a sideline in dodgy cockney accents. Thus their foreboding vision of a Great British ‘Kingdom of Doom’, running on gas and war, and characterised by oddity (Northern Whale), and crass stupidity, is worth a considered listen.
In contrast Bloc Party are the spotty, disjointed art-school types that surely strike fear and contempt in the hearts of the average Economist reader (actually this probably isn’t entirely true, as I’ve witnessed that bastion of apparently enlightened neo-liberalism craftily hidden behind the latest copy of Art-Forum). Bloc Party are presumably more capable of grading the state of Shoreditch (‘East London is a vampire…’) than summating the vast and confusing entity that is modern Britain. And yet arguably their angle is no less worthy – although in all honesty the album isn’t that good; references to terrorism, allusions to complicated sexuality, and the ever present shadow of the 1980s and Thatcherism are at least name-checked. Oh, and there’s the war. Still like so much political sentiment expressed in music there’s a tendency for it all to be a little gauche. Killing your ‘middle class indecision’ may be easier said than done, especially if you read The Economist.
I have to say I enjoy ‘Kingdom of Doom’ more. Perhaps this is just a sign of another generation slipping into the type of pathetic ancestor worship which my ilk often profess to revile (nuts to the Rolling Stones and Dylan, blah blah). Still there’s reason enough in the ‘Kingdom’ to celebrate a musical Britain that reviles its political class, and is alienated from the economic success that has led to ipods for all (alright some – but you could always steal one). This all leaves me, rather predictably, reflecting, as many others have, on the similar trajectories of Britpop and Blairism. You can’t help feeling battered old Britpop still came out slightly better off. Damon Albarn reinvented himself and is now a bastion of modern British music, whilst Tony Blair remains the political equivalent to the flaccid aged corpse rock he professes to enjoy. And so it is in the Kingdom of Doom.
