This moving new doc asks existential questions of the indie icons on their road to Wembley “T ime is not infinite,” offers Blur’ s Damon Albarn in the opening scene of new documentary film, To The End . Born of the Britpop age that promised so much, the band now in their 36th year and on their second comeback seem acutely aware that they aren’t, as their gobby rivals once promised a generation, going to “live forever”. We begin with Albarn enjoying a pastoral existence on the rural Devon coast; getting cut up by Land Rovers on winding roads, celebrating the first egg from his beloved pet chicken and living in a very big house in the country.
But all’s not well. Shattered by the split from his partner of 25 years, the self-confessed workaholic turns his heartache into song – and can only do it with his oldest friends around him. As guitarist Graham Coxon puts it, “a boulder is dislodged” within his pal – with two decades of pent up emotion pouring out.
That frank and honest storyline alone (we often see the frontman struggling and in tears) would have made for a must-see film, but the stakes are higher. As well as charting the indie legends’ recording of their immaculate comeback album ‘ The Ballad Of Darren ’, To The End also follows them on the road to a pair of shows at London’s Wembley Stadium . Directed by Transgressive Records founder Toby L, To The End is a joyful and touching tale of a band crawling out of their Last Of The Summer Wine yea.