We're rarely starved for new music featuring Damon Albarn but it's not every day you get a new Blur album.
The Ballad of Darren is the Britpop icons' first record in eight years and probably the first in many more where they've just sounded like four guys playing in a room together.
Albarn has called it "the first legit" Blur album since 1999's 13, despite two records passing since then. That's owing to the fact guitarist Graham Coxon split around the release of 2003's electronic-leaning Think Tank. Meanwhile, 2015 comeback The Magic Whip was comprised of abandoned sessions Coxon completed in secret.
Blur's ninth studio effort is a strikingly less experimental affair than either of those releases, and from its album sleeve reviving the classic logo and evoking their early discography to its straightforward songwriting, this is a band reconnecting with their foundational chemistry.
However, don't expect anything like 'Parklife' or 'Song 2'.
Long gone are the cheeky reflections on Cool Britannia and boundary-pushing pop, instead we have a record that's largely mid-tempo and mellow in sound, deeply reflective and poignant in tone.
It's the very definition of a grower, with the charms of these 10 relatively simple, sometimes sleepy new songs revealing themselves over time to be tear-jerking interrogations of loss, love, and deep bonds undone by time.
'I just looked into my life, and all I saw was that you're not coming back' Albarn laments on opener 'The Ballad', a slow-burning song brought to completion after the frontman was encouraged by the album's namesake — longtime friend and crew member Darren 'Smoggy' Evans.
Worth the price of admission alone, 'The Narcissist' is an infectious, hopeful number with heavily coded lyrics about looking in the rear-view at a career of ups and downs.
Worlds apart from the gonzo pop of Gorillaz and his artsy solo work, Albarn brings some of his most deeply personal and empathetic songwriting in years.
He regrets the 'many paths I wish I'd taken' on the downtempo 'The Everglades (For Leonard)' and wishes 'he could still make you happy' on the horns-laden 'Avalon'. Between the burbling groove of 'Goodbye Albert' he pleads in a pained tenor 'why don't you talk to me anymore? Don't punish me forever'.
'Russian Strings' is a compelling portrait of disconnection, the frontman singing about retreating to Belgrade, hitting "the hard stuff" and failing to hear a tenement block being demolished because his headphones are so loud.
It could be a crafty metaphor for Albarn's own romance – the lyrics heavily suggest he and long-term partner Suzy Winstanley have separated – but also could regard the challenges of making any meaningful relationships last, including his Blur bandmates.
Coxon, bassist Alex James and drummer Dave Rowntree certainly bring a lot to the table, leaning into the sentimental atmosphere but also keeping the divorced dad energy from being overwhelming.
'St. Charles Square' is a graceful stab at a distorted, knockabout rock stomper and best of all is 'Barbaric', which contrasts some truly sad lines ('I would like if you've got the time / To talk to you about what this break-up has done to me') with warm, almost jaunty melodies.
The members of Blur could simply be living comfortably off the residuals of their past successes or continuing their extra-musical occupations (cheese farming for James, politics for Rowntree). They could be cashing in on endless farewell tours and doling out the hits.
Instead, they're committing to extending their legacy, and as one of the very few Britpop era bands still making worthwhile work (here's looking at you, Gallagher brothers) that deserves extra credit.
It's unlikely The Ballad Of Darren is going to dethrone the classics as Blur fans' #1 album of choice but it stands uniquely as being a work of art that only a group of wiser musicians in their fifties could make.
It's touching to see their creativity still firing, to hear Coxon's call-and-response vocals chime with Albarn's, or the sense of hard-won drama etched into closer 'The Heights', which offers heartfelt poetics before being swallowed up in a tide of distortion.
'I'll see you in the heights one day, I'll get there too
I'll be standing in the front row, next to you'
If The Ballad of Darren turns out to be Blur's final album, that's a lovely way to sign off.