Bastille teamed up with Blur‘s Graham Coxon for their single “WHAT YOU GONNA DO???” last year, so it probably won’t come as a surprise that frontman Dan Smith picks Damon Albarn and company over their Britpop rivals, Oasis. As Smith tells ABC Audio, he always felt that the “Song 2” rockers were “much more interesting” than the “Wonderwall” band.

“[Blur] always had a lot more to say,” Smith says. “In fact, they had anything to say.”

“Oh, don’t get me wrong, Oasis write an amazing song — or they used to, when they existed,” he adds. “But, yeah, for me, Blur were always just much more interesting.”

The Oasis/Blur rivalry hit a fever pitch during the height of the ’90s Britpop scene, partly due to media hype, and partly due to genuine animosity between the two groups. And while Smith does prefer Blur, he never quite understood why they and Oasis were always pitted against each other.

“Yes, they both consisted of a bunch of dudes playing music with guitars,” Smith says. “But, for me, the similarity ends there.”

In fact, Smith doesn’t see much use in the idea of a music rivalry at all. As he puts it, tons of artists are “only making music ’cause they didn’t want to play sports.”

“So the idea of making it a competition is totally mad and absurd to me,” he says. “But, you know, whatever.” 

“WHAT YOU GONNA DO???” appears on Bastille’s new EP Goosebumps, which was released in December. The collection also includes the new songs “survivin'” and “Goosebumps.”

By Josh Johnson
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