Blur frontman Damon Albarn has revealed that he didn’t want to perform during the band’s second Wembley show last year.
In November 2022, Blur announced a reunion gig at Wembley Stadium for July 8, 2023. Due to overwhelming demand, the reunion gig turned into a two-parter, with a second show announced shortly after.
That second show – which took place on July 9 – went on to become their “best ever” gig, according to Albarn himself. However, the July 9 show was on the verge of being cancelled by Albarn, who didn’t want to perform.
Albarn revealed the near-cancellation during an interview with KROQ during Coachella‘s opening weekend, sharing: “I never thought I’d love Wembley. The first night was great, and then the next night, I didn’t want to do another gig. I was trying to find reasons to cancel it. I was sitting in a hotel at Wembley Parks, like a travel lodge or something, and I was watching these people coming in and I was like, ‘Well I can’t cancel that’.”
He continued: “And it was actually, maybe the best gig in that time that you could ever, ever dream of having. But it was weird, I was really not into going onstage, and then I was on stage and it was very nice to do that.”
Elsewhere in the interview, Albarn and Alex James spoke of Blur’s upcoming documentary about their reunion, the Wembley gigs and their comeback album ‘The Ballad Of Darren’. James said: “It’s eight years since we last did anything – even when we actually split up, it didn’t take that long to get it together. So there was a certain amount of jeopardy potentially at the beginning, trying to make a new record at this stage of your career. Most bands don’t even like each other 30 years in, let alone make decent records. I suppose there’s a lot to blame for. I guess if you like the band, it’s a good band. We filmed the shows at Wembley, and I never thought we’d top Glastonbury 2009.”
Following their chat with KROQ, Blur went on to perform to a lacklustre crowd at Coachella. During the show, Albarn aired his frustration live on stage while performing to the unenthusiastic crowd. “You can do it better than that,” he told attendees at one point, which was met by a quiet crowd. When he still didn’t get the desired response, the frontman said: “You’re never seeing us again, so you might as well fucking sing it. Know what I’m saying?”
Though the frontman shared that this would be the last time the crowd saw the legendary Britpop group, the band are set to return to the Coachella valley for weekend two of the festival this weekend (April 19-21).