FIB 2015: Blur Come Home

The announcement that Blur would headline FIB Benicassim 2015 was one of those moments that triggered an immediate and decisive response. Tickets for the 2015 edition sold faster than for any previous year in recent memory. The reunion that fans had stopped believing would ever happen was actually happening, and it was happening in Spain, in the heat, on the beach that had become the spiritual home of British festival culture abroad.

FIB 2015 ran from 16 to 19 July. The bill around Blur was strong across all four days, with Alt-J, The Prodigy and a rich selection of Spanish and international acts filling out a programme that justified the trip even before Blur took the stage.

Blur and the New Album

The context for Blur in 2015 was significant. The Magic Whip, their first studio album in sixteen years, had been released in April to reviews that ranged from warm to ecstatic. It was an album that sounded like a band genuinely re-engaged with each other rather than one going through the motions for commercial reasons, and that quality carried over directly into the live shows.

At FIB, Blur played a headline set that wove new material from The Magic Whip into a run of songs from across their career. "Beetlebum", "Coffee & TV", "Girls & Boys" and "Song 2" all arrived at the points in the set where they could do maximum damage, and the crowd - a large proportion of whom had grown up with these songs - responded accordingly. Damon Albarn was in excellent voice and clearly delighted to be performing in the Mediterranean heat rather than at a British festival in the rain.

Graham Coxon's presence was, for many in the crowd, the real headline. His return to the band after years of estrangement had seemed genuinely unlikely for a long time, and seeing him and Albarn share a stage again felt like watching something be repaired. The chemistry between them was obvious from the first song.

Alt-J Deliver a Masterclass

Alt-J were in the middle of a period of extraordinary commercial and critical momentum in 2015, and their FIB set reflected that confidence. The combination of Joe Newman's unusual guitar lines, Thom Sonny Green's thunderous drumming and the band's unique approach to harmony created something that stood apart from everything else on the bill. "Tessellate", "Breezeblocks" and "Something Good" all sounded enormous in the open air.

Their set demonstrated exactly the kind of act that FIB programmes so well: substantial enough to headline on another bill, perfectly placed in the middle of this one, and genuinely thrilling rather than merely competent.

The Prodigy Bring the Heat

The Prodigy are, at this point, a FIB institution. They had headlined the festival before 2015 and would headline again after. Their ability to convert a festival crowd into a unified, moving mass is unmatched in British music, and in the July heat of Benicassim the effect is heightened to an almost absurd degree. The set drew heavily on Music for the Jilted Generation and The Fat of the Land, with newer material woven in for colour, and the result was exactly what everyone in the field wanted.

Why 2015 Stands Out

The 2015 edition of FIB stands out in the festival's recent history for a specific reason: it was the year that a reunion felt genuinely earned. Blur's return was not a nostalgia exercise. It was a band that had written a good new album, wanted to play it live, and chose Benicassim as one of the stages on which to do so. That distinction matters. The crowd felt it, the band felt it, and the result was one of the most emotionally satisfying headline sets the festival has ever hosted.