Blur whip up branded ice cream for UK tour

First there was cheese, then a brief foray into fizzy drinks, but Blur’s latest food-based affiliation is to be ice cream.

To coincide with the release of their latest album The Magic Whip, the band are to launch their own brand of ice cream which will be sold during their forthcoming UK dates.

Created alongside “independent ice cream revolutionaries” the Licktators — who last month celebrated the birth of Princess Charlotte by producing breast milk ice cream — the new Blur product will be “a dairy vanilla custard ice cream rippled with raspberry sauce”, mirroring that of their new album artwork.

While it is not yet known whether The Magic Whip product will be sold alongside the rest of their merchandise at gigs, or from behind the bar, the ice cream will also be available at selected Co-Operative stores in June, and was road-tested earlier this month when custom ice cream vans appeared across London. This is the latest culinary excursion associated with the band. Cheese maker Alex James famously declared that “... my 40s are about food” and set about achieving his ambitions by launching the short-lived Alex James Presents range from Asda, including a range of cheeses including Cheddar & Ketchup and Cheddar & Salad Cream slices. The bassist also submitted an application for the Britpop trademark in October 2013, reportedly with intentions to create a new brand of drink. The application covered a range of flavours such as “non-alcoholic beer”, “sherbet beverages”, “soda water”, “alcohol containing fruit”, “tomato juice”, “cream liqueurs” and “tequila”, among other ingredients, but has yet to materialise.

The Magic Whip is Blur’s first album in 12 years, their sixth No 1 album and first since Think Tank.