NME You'll have caught a glimpse of him in the past, but he'd have vanished before you could be sure it was really him you saw. Roaming from Primrose Hill to the white-pillared multi-lets of Emperor's Gate, in the offices and recreation grounds, on the overland service to Victoria from Purley or Norwood. Maybe you fixed a sighting of him with the girls and boys in Mykonos, or throwing off his clothes on a shingle beach, and swimming out to sea. Asked yourself if, in some way, that quango belonged to him. And, above all, wondered if any or all of them were the writer unmasked: the true image of the oompah-oompah man, pushing his cinema organ through the England he implicitly understands. Was that - under the suit, wolfing down the lager, tossing another banger on the patio barbecue - was that really Damon Albarn? 'Blur' is last orders at the Albarn Fun Pub - a neon drinkerie with a weekly cabaret turn and no workmen's attire permitted - and we shall perhaps not see the establishment's like again. Gone the clientele: the business travellers, the holiday clubbers, the young romantics. Goodnight to Tracy Jacks (a dark horse, but soooo artistic), to Colin Zeal, to Mr Robinson, to Ernold Same, and goodnight to the entertainment, too. The characters, the drama, the moments of unexpected beauty that Damon Albarn trainspotted and transformed from the regular commuter service of popular culture into his metropolitan theatre have run dry, and 'Blur' is where we find him taking stock of what he has achieved and moving on. The 'Life' trilogy completed, Blur are without an agenda for the first time since 'Leisure'. They have documented national idiosyncrasies and hypocrisies; finished the course of treatment, and gamely traipsed to the newsagent with their lucky numbers. When they look to the News Of The World, it is no longer for inspiration, for the same voyeuristic thrill of knowing that this is what goes on, but instead to find out what they've been up to and whom they were with last night. The pantomime of Britpop threatened to make Blur the same sort of national caricature they formerly described, and this is where they call a halt. Open up a bit. Tell us how they really feel... This, if you can take it, is an album about themselves. And they frequently sound uncertain, for this is a giant step of reinvention. Just as David Bowie (the ghosts of whose former glories make moments of this album quite magnificent) today appears a somewhat hopeful lunger after the sound of youth, so Blur here occasionally sound less bound up with the fabric of modern life - all Prozac and '...Morning Glory' - and rather more like young men grown prematurely old, gratefully noting the signpost to what's hip. Old Blur was about strings finely plucked, about attention to detail, about rendering beautiful the substance of other people's lives. New Blur is about confusion, about what they feel and so it is about scuffed edges, new influences; the same incredible talent for songwriting but twisted into uncomfortable shapes. It's just that where once (Piers! Suits! Clacton!) these influences were wildly out there, now (Tortoise! Beastie Boys! Er, guitars!) they're already so widely available, this abrupt change of sound can't help but sound like a purely cosmetic calculation. That's Damon Albarn. The only man who could get uptight about not appearing slack enough. It's an American thing, and one of the most disquieting about 'Blur': the idea that sounding untutored - like whacking a hardcore punk song like 'Chinese Bombs' next to a masterful hymn to inertia like 'Death Of A Party' - is in some way a genuinely truthful expression. Through Blur's previous three albums, it has been the sensitivity of the arrangements - the spectre of self-doubt lurking in 'Country House' - that has elevated their songs into the realm of the masterpiece. Missing the point a bit, Blur seem to be attempting to unlearn their craft to appear more 'real'.