Blur 21 is a CD, DVD and vinyl box set encompassing the vast majority of music by Blur. It was released on 30 July 2012, commemorating the 21st anniversary of the release of the first Blur album, Leisure. The release took place before Blur's performance at Hyde Park as part of the 2012 Summer Olympics closing ceremony. One version consists of eighteen CDs, three DVDs, one vinyl 7" record (of the early Seymour track "Superman") and a hardcover biography book. The CDs contain all seven Blur studio albums released at the time, with the first five remastered, and with each album receiving a new second disc of B-side material, and four discs containing mostly previously unreleased material. The DVDs contain Showtime, The Singles Night and an all-new rarities disc.
Another boxset, Blur 21 Vinyl Edition, was released at the same time, featuring Blur's seven studio albums on heavyweight vinyl, each of the LPs repackaged as a double album except for Leisure, a single album. The vinyl edition contains no previously unreleased material. As above, the Blur 21 CD/DVD/7" single pack contains many previously unreleased recordings, including the long-awaited releases of songs like "Pap Pop," "Beached Whale" and "Sir Elton John's Cock".
The box set also includes a special code to download all the music content as MP3, along with all the Blurb magazine issues and extra content with audio commentary and unreleased footage per album.
Reception
Blur 21 received positive reviews. On Metacritic, it has a score of 92 out of 100, based on 17 reviews. Stephen Thomas Erlewine of AllMusic wrote, "There were plenty of other great British bands of the '90s but none of their peers – Oasis, Suede, Pulp, Radiohead – covered as much stylistic ground or wound up with a catalog as rich as this ridiculously generous box set handily proves."[ Allmusic review]
Track listing
References