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What has changed for Damon Albarn is that he no longer excludes himself from the itinerary. Rather than punchlines in a vignette, however, now these lives are drawn with more empathy and take their place in the albumвЂ™s more melancholic journey: the travellers are like вЂњstanding stonesвЂќ and while they may attempt a reboot of their lives, theirs is the inexorable journey to the grave. The title track introduces us to the electronic/acoustic soundworld he has devised for the album with producer Richard Russell, and also reacquaints us with some familiar archetypes: the British commuter travelling home to his pleasant suburban residence, by car, communicating on his phone. Strangely, then, Everyday Robots doesnвЂ™t begin with a personal song at all вЂ“ but in fact with the kind of observational piece that we might once have thought characteristic of Blur. Everyday Robots, Albarn has explained, explores the uneasy transition. The place helped inspire 1994вЂ™s Parklife, BlurвЂ™s hugely successful sideways glance at British culture. When his parents moved, he was transplanted to villagey, predominantly white Essex. More striking, however, has been the revelation that this gregarious and good-looking artist вЂ“ the principal architect of the laddish 1990s Britpop movement вЂ“ has often felt Вvulnerable.ДЄlbarn spent his formative years in Leytonstone, East London, with its gospel choirs and boating lake, the Hollow Ponds. The headline news: in the past there has been hard drug use вЂ“ long rumoured but never previously confirmed. What he has uncovered has been surprising. To make the album, Damon Albarn has, in effect, gone on the road and researched himself. This, he has explained, has been a journey through emotional geography, a stock-take in midlife of his story so far.

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With a BBC film and a series of subtly confessional interviews, meanwhile, he has introduced the wider concerns of the album. Far from being a chaotic affair, though, the album has been heralded by pre-publicity that has methodically outlined its intentions.ДЄ single, Lonely Press Play, with footage shot by the singer on his iPad in locations significant to him, has introduced the themes of personal history, memory and technology that are wired into the album (it also includes references to LCDs, pressing send and restart). Listening to the album is like watching someone trying to put a brave face on things, only for the mask to slip.Д®veryday Robots, the first 'proper' Damon Albarn solo album (alongside his many pseudonymous works with West African musicians there have been a scattershot solo collection, Democrazy, from 2003 and a cross-genre work from 2012, Dr Dee) has been billed as just such a personal record. Bookended by such yearning and accomplished ballads as Tender and No Distance Left to Run, elsewhere in the album, autobiographical songs such as 1992 and Battle delivered an expertly managed musical chaos that enacted the emotional drama within them. BlurвЂ™s 1999 album 13 was written after the demise of his long-term relationship with ElasticaвЂ™s Justine Frischmann, and grieved for it Вopenly.

Which is not to imply Albarn has never worn his heart on his sleeve. His songs take a place in a tradition of British vernacular composition that stretches from music hall, through to The Kinks, all the way to the Arctic Monkeys. With material like Girls & Boys (a ribald disco number about mating rituals on package holidays), For Tomorrow (an urban romance) or Tracy Jacks (the tragedy of a misunderstood commuter), his best-known songs for Blur established him as gifted not only with melody but also with social satire and character. Damon Albarn has traditionally addressed life in the third person.

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