The Great Escape

<i>The Great Escape</i> presents a merry-go-round of British pop pleasures. Chamber music and psychedelia intersect to create the tipsy glow of “Ernold Same”, while the band’s sharp-tongued brashness stokes “Entertain Me”, a cocktail of punk and disco. With a voice that shifts from gentle murmur to desperate cry, Damon Albarn plays the role of Cockney ringmaster to the hilt, introducing listeners to the venomous caricatures of “Mr. Robinson’s Quango” and “Dan Abnormal” only to return us to the moody but magnificent pub sing-alongs of “Country House” and “Charmless Man”.