Song · Blur
“Coffee & TV” by Blur
From the album 13 (1999)
“Coffee & TV” by Blur appears on 12 radio countdowns from 8 stations between 1999 and 2025. It was first released in 1999 on the album 13. Its best result is #8 on the Virgin Radio Top 10 Songs of 1999. In the combined RockLists rankings it is the #161 alternative song of 1999 and #5,756 alternative song of all time.
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"Coffee & TV" is the one on Blur's 13 where Graham Coxon steps up to the mic, and it was released as the album's second single on 28 June 1999. Damon Albarn couldn't finish the song, so Coxon wrote the words himself and sang them, a plainspoken account of fighting his drinking and filling the sober hours with television, coffee and songwriting.
William Orbit produced it with the band in late 1998, and the tune is deceptively sweet: Albarn on acoustic guitar and melodica, Alex James and Dave Rowntree keeping it bouncy, until Coxon tears through a wrong-footed, improvised solo that sounds like the hangover finally catching up. Garth Jennings made the video, the one with the wandering milk carton hunting for Coxon, and it collected a stack of awards. It went to No. 11 in the UK.
Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.
RockLists rankings
Alternative & Modern Rock
Indie & Adult Alternative
All Rock Formats
Year-end countdowns
| Year | # | Station | Countdown | of |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1999 | 8 | Virgin Radio United Kingdom | Virgin Radio Top 10 Songs of 1999 | 10 |
| 1999 | 47 | Triple J Australia (national) | Triple J Hottest 100 of 1999 | 100 |
All-time and decade countdowns
| Year | # | Station | Countdown | of |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2001 | 374 | Virgin Radio | Virgin Radio Top 500 Songs of All-Time (December 2001) | 500 |
| 2003 | 68 | Virgin Radio | Virgin Radio VR10x10 (April 2003) | 100 |
| 2005 | 463 | WOXY 97X | WOXY Modern Rock 500 (2005) | 500 |
| 2006 | 474 | WOXY 97X | WOXY Modern Rock 500 (2006) | 499 |
| 2007 | 891 | WTMD | WTMD Top 897 Songs of All Time | 897 |
| 2019 | 205 | KEXP | KEXP Listeners' Favorite Songs of All Time | 627 |
| 2022 | 161 | KEXP | KEXP Top Songs of the Last 50 Years (1972-2022) | 491 |
| 2023 | 357 | The Current | The Current's 893 Essential Songs of the '90s | 893 |
| 2025 | 250 | WFPK | WFPK Top 500 Songs of the '90s | 500 |
| 2025 | 88 | Absolute Radio | Absolute Radio 100 Ultimate Britpop Anthems | 100 |
Also listed as: Coffee & Tv; Coffee and TV; Coffee and T.V.; Coffee And TV.
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