One of Damon Albarn's great gifts as a pop singer, over the past decade or so, has been his ability to ignore so much of the criticism and ridicule directed at him. Only the biggest superstars, perhaps, can maintain such iron-clad certainty that what they are doing is simultaneously groundbreaking and consistent, no matter how hypocritical some moves may look to the outside world.
It's this kind of attitude that seems to lie behind the release of 'Democrazy' - a limited edition, vinyl-only collection of solo demos recorded in various hotel rooms on Blur's last American tour. On one level, these 13 unfeasibly sketchy pieces represent a conscious attempt by Albarn to portray himself as much more human and vulnerable than his detractors often claim.
But what's most revealing about 'Democrazy' is how unrevealing Albarn's songs, in their formative stages, appear to be. As he sits on some hotel bed and doodles on a faintly malfunctioning toy keyboard, or winds his possibly steam-powered drumbox up one more time, there are precious few glimpses of this master tactician's psyche. Instead, it uncovers one of two things: that even the greatest Blur songs begin life as aimless, inanely-rhymed snippets; or that Albarn's songwriting may be losing its lustre - something which those of us who thought 'Think Tank' was the band's worst album by far already suspected.
Intimacy? Soul-baring? How about this from 'Gotta Get Down With The Passing Of Time': "I was at the Niagara Falls today and they really didn't make me want to jump in. Oh that's good." Occasionally, as on the unsteady reverie of 'Sub Species Of An American Day', Albarn sounds authentically knackered. But by 'End Of Democrazy', his reliable self-consciousness has triumphed again, and he's writing a song that ostensibly concerns itself with being on tour and staying up all night recording demos. The tragedy of it is unbearable, for all the wrong reasons.
To criticise 'Democrazy' for being musically incompetent is to miss the point, of course. But its purposes for existing - to demystify the creative process, to show Albarn as an artist capable of making a fool of himself - are equally disingenuous. Releasing the likes of 'A Rappy Song' (every bit as bad as its title) don't make us see Albarn as touchingly fallible, they just seem like the folly of an egotist who believes even his most embarrassing moments have intrinsic cultural value. There's some irony, too, that the best song here - the lackadaisacal countryish strum of 'Gotta Get Down With The Passing Of Time' - resembles some of Graham Coxon's solo material, only less coherent. On the evidence of 'Democrazy', the wrong self-indulgent flake got fired from Blur.
