"Country House" is a song by English alternative rock band Blur. It was released as the lead single from the band's fourth studio album, The Great Escape (1995), on 14 August 1995 by Food and Parlophone. Released on the same day as the Oasis single "Roll with It" – in a chart battle dubbed the "Battle of Britpop" – "Country House" reached number one in the UK Singles Chart (the first of two Blur singles to reach number one, the second being 1997's "Beetlebum").[1] The song is the band's best-selling single, with over 540,000 copies sold as of May 2014.[2] Its music video was directed by Damien Hirst and nominated for Best Video in the 1996 BRIT Awards.
In an interview for the South Bank Show, Damon Albarn explained that it was inspired by former Blur manager Dave Balfe, who left Blur's label Food Records and bought a house in the country.[3] Balfe moved to The Bury[4] in 1994 at Church End, Barton-le-Clay in southern Bedfordshire off the A6. The house had 4 acres of land, nine bedrooms with five en-suite. He moved with his wife Helen and their children aged 2 and 4, when he was 36. The house was advertised in 2015 for £2m. It was Grade 2 listed in February 1975.[5][6]
The song is about a man who retires to an expensive country house to escape the pressures of the city. The cover art features a horizontally-flipped image of Neuschwanstein CastleinBavaria.[7]
"Country House" received a great deal of media attention when Blur's label Food Records moved the original release date to the same day as Oasis's "Roll with It". The British media had already reported an intense rivalry between the two bands and this clash of releases was seen as a battle for the number one spot, dubbed the "Battle of Britpop". In the end, "Country House" won the "battle", attaining the No. 1 spot while "Roll with It" came in at No. 2.[8][9] Albarn himself was surprised that "Country House" topped the charts. He told NME, "I sort of believed all the papers, including NME, who told me Oasis were going to win."[10]
David Stubbs from Melody Maker felt the song "sounds at first to be taunting us with that old Britpop standard, um, thingummy, the one that goes Our house is a very, very, very nice house/With two cats in the yard.. but turns out to be a cynical account of the miserable fat-rat city achiever attempting to find solace in the big rural pile of his dreams — a seemingly chirpy but ultimately very unsettling vignette hinting at Blur's darker edges."[11] Mark Sutherland from NME named it Single of the Week, writing, "Yup, Blur's first new material since the epoch-shaping Parklife LP is nothing short of a classic pop single. In the space of the time-honoured three-and-a-bit minutes, it manages to recall everyone from MadnesstoThe Beatles to, um, Chas and Dave, craft the most infectious chorus of modern times and still squeeze in the astonishing line He's reading Balzac, knocking back Prozac before tea-time. And you can't really ask for much more than that."[12] Another NME editor, Johnny Cigarettes, described it as "feisty, upbeat singalong pop".[13]
Music video
[edit]Pyrton Manor in Oxfordshire, the setting for external shots in the music video
The music video for "Country House" was directed by English artist and art collector Damien Hirst, who had attended Goldsmiths, University of London, with members of Blur. It features the band and a businessman (played by Keith Allen) in a flat with the band playing a board game called "Escape from the Rat Race" before they become trapped in the game where they are with farm animals and other people before appearing in the flat again. The band appears in the video alongside British comic actor Matt Lucas and models Sara Stockbridge, Jo Guest and Vanessa Upton. It features pastiches of—or tributes to—Benny Hill (Lucas' doctor chasing scantily clad young women culminating in the entry of the milk van of Ernie (The Fastest Milkman in the West)) and Queen's 1975 video for "Bohemian Rhapsody". It was nominated for Best Video in the 1996 BRIT Awards.
The external shots of the video are at Pyrton Manor, Pyrton, in east Oxfordshire, west of junction 6 of the M40, near the B4009 and Watlington. It is now home of Vogue writer Laura Bailey, and is the former home of the 1956 High Sheriff of Oxfordshire. It is Elizabethan, built around the start of the 17th century.
The song was covered by the Wurzels on their 2002 album Never Mind the Bullocks, 'Ere is The Wurzels[42] and Out of the Blue on their 2005 album Freefall.[43]
^Sutherland, Mark (12 August 1995). "Singles". NME. p. 39. Retrieved 14 February 2024.
^Cigarettes, Johnny (9 September 1995). "Long Play". NME. p. 46. Retrieved 11 March 2024.
^Country House (UK CD1 & Australian CD single liner notes). Blur. Food Records, Parlophone. 1995. CDFOOD 63, 7243 8 82338 2 8.{{cite AV media notes}}: CS1 maint: others in cite AV media (notes) (link)
^Country House (UK CD2 liner notes). Blur. Food Records, Parlophone. 1995. CDFOODS 63, 7243 8 82379 2 5.{{cite AV media notes}}: CS1 maint: others in cite AV media (notes) (link)
^Country House (UK 7-inch single sleeve). Blur. Food Records, Parlophone. 1995. FOOD 63, 7243 8 82338 7 3.{{cite AV media notes}}: CS1 maint: others in cite AV media (notes) (link)
^Country House (UK cassette single sleeve). Blur. Food Records, Parlophone. 1995. TC FOOD 63.{{cite AV media notes}}: CS1 maint: others in cite AV media (notes) (link)
^Country House (European CD single liner notes). Blur. Food Records, Parlophone. 1995. 7243 8 82365 2 2.{{cite AV media notes}}: CS1 maint: others in cite AV media (notes) (link)
^Country House (Japanese CD single liner notes). Blur. Food Records, EMI Japan. 1995. TOCP-8634, 7243 8 82338 2 8.{{cite AV media notes}}: CS1 maint: others in cite AV media (notes) (link)
