Remember Bugman? No, some of us do not. While the pop wave of Blur may have come and gone during the mid-1990s, some of us were born the same year Coffee & TV released. 90s kids quake in their boots. Those seven days in 1999 were the best of our lives, and yet we did not hear the joys of Graham Coxon on lead vocals for a Blur song until we hit our 20s, milling around and looking for new noise to plug holes in the schedule. It is worth championing Coffee & TV not just because Coxon takes over from Damon Albarn for a lead performance but because of its shocking cultural impact. A music video in The Sopranos and one of the finest tracks the band ever put together. Coxon would soon turn to frequent solo works but none of them captured the feelings of uncertainty as heard on Coffee & TV.
As honest an assessment of his struggle as it gets. Coxon has found himself detailing alcoholism and his relationship with drinking more in his writing than in his instrumental sections. But the two go hand in hand here, a delicate pairing which relies on one of the finer guitar solos of his time in Blur. The likes of Coffee & TV truly lend themselves to the argument for Coxon as one of the all-time greats. Here he gets the chance to display the lyrical skill and instrumental style which formed Blur, his solo works and later The Waeve. All of it can be heard here, working in perfect synchronisation. Layer after layer can be found in Coffee & TV. The missing person on the side of a milk carton as Coxon searches for himself under the layers of excess and fame. Distorted guitar paired with calm lyrics brings on a presentation of surface-level content while the burning fires of contempt rage below. It is as smart a track as you could hope for, and the B-Sides for it aren’t half bad either.
Alex James and Ben Hiller get to work on Trade Stylee, a funk and electronic-laden soundscape which feels more like the early interpretations of Americanised electronic indie. Think LCD Soundsystem with a vocoder utilised by Acid Klaus. It makes for a fascinating extra addition and is a very enjoyable piece, especially when paired with Metal Hip Slop from Coxon. James edges out Coxon when it comes to these remixes but there is much to love about the industrialised horrors which sound off through Metal Hip Slop. Perhaps the title is a giveaway, but what a fascinating change of pace to the usual run of 13 tracks these three make.
Distortion, confusion and heavy heads flow through tracks of bright guitar material. Coxon is at his best here, something he has managed to hit time and again with later works. These are the spoils of a man with a lot on his mind and not enough space on the album to figure it out. Coffee & TV is loaded full of light joys and dark truths, the same goes for his remix. Hunt down a copy of this if you can. It would sound wonderful on vinyl, that much is assured by the two remixes which make this one of many quality Blur deep dives.
