Graham Coxon has released “Alright”, the second single from his shelved 2011 album Castle Park. The track lands like a message accidentally trapped in amber, carrying all the bittersweet melody and restless guitar-pop instinct that made Coxon one of British indie’s most distinctive musical voices in the first place.
Originally recorded during the A+E sessions in 2011 with producer Ben Hillier, Castle Park was intended as Coxon’s next solo release before Blur activity pulled him back into the gravitational orbit of one of Britain’s most important bands. The album was quietly shelved as other projects emerged, leaving songs like “Billy Says” and now “Alright” suspended in time. Listening now, the material feels remarkably intact rather than dated, leaning heavily into Coxon’s sharp-edged mod-pop sensibilities while still carrying the bruised emotional directness that has always separated his solo work from Britpop nostalgia exercises.
If “Billy Says” channelled echoes of The Kinks through jangling guitar hooks and kitchen-sink melancholy, “Alright” feels even closer to the lineage of “Coffee & TV”: weary-eyed, melodic and quietly devastating beneath its deceptively warm surface. Coxon has always had a gift for disguising loneliness inside songs that feel instantly hummable, and this track continues that tradition effortlessly.
Coxon remains an enduring figure. While many guitar heroes calcified into legacy caricatures long ago, his career has remained stubbornly exploratory. Folk, krautrock, lo-fi punk, soundtrack composition, visual art, collaborations with everyone from Paul Weller to Olivia Rodrigo, and more recently the spectral art-rock of The WAEVE alongside Rose Elinor Dougall. The through-line has never really been genre so much as curiosity.
Stream “Alright” HERE.
The album will be released on 19 June. Pre-order it HERE.
