Tender

The harmony of 'Tender' is deliberately plain — three basic triads in a near-circular loop, closer to a church hymn than to anything in Blur's earlier catalogue. What distinguishes it is not harmonic complexity but the weight the London Community Gospel Choir places on those chords, transforming a folk-scale palette into something closer to devotional music. At a time when the band was known for oblique, art-rock arrangements, that plainness was the point.

All four members of Blur — Damon Albarn, Graham Coxon, Alex James, and Dave Rowntree — share writing credits on 'Tender'. The lyrics, sung jointly by Albarn and Coxon, describe the end of Albarn's long relationship with Justine Frischmann, then lead singer of Elastica. Frischmann told The Observer that she cried on first hearing it, then felt embarrassed and angered before eventually coming to terms with the song.

'Tender' broke from Blur's Britpop template with a slow, choir-backed meditation on Damon Albarn's split from Justine Frischmann. The lead single from their 1999 album 13, it debuted at number two on the UK Singles Chart and became one of the defining ballads of the era. William Orbit's production strips the band back to something close to a folk hymn — over seven and three-quarter minutes.