083: Gorillaz, by Gorillaz

Gorillaz (United Kingdom)
Gorillaz (2001)
16 tracks, 61 minutes
Spotify • iTunes

Gorillaz are one of the biggest bands around nowadays, so it feels a little disingenuous to talk about this album as though you’ve never heard it. I think their other albums have surpassed the debut in terms of popularity, though, so I think this one deserves another look.

I don’t know why, but I still approach this album in the same way as I did when it first came out. It was mysterious. They were referred to as ‘the first virtual band,’ but I think that was just the early 2000s excitement with the internet coming through a bit; what it actually meant was that the band members were basically anonymous, masquerading behind cartoon characters. It was common knowledge that it was fronted by Damon Albarn of Blur, but the rest were unknown (to me, at least). As such, there wasn’t much clue as to what the music was going to be like.

It turns out, it was going to be a lot. It was some mix between alternative rock and hip-hop, but that’s only half of it. There’s lots of trip hop and dub in there, punk and pop occasionally too. And it’s all done so well, no matter where it travels. It even goes to Cuba, with guest vocals from Buena Vista Social Club legend Ibrahim Ferrer.

If I had to pick, I’d say the album is best when it’s straddling the line between hip-hop and trip-hop…but there’s really no point in picking favourite tracks because they are literally all great. ‘Clint Eastwood’ with the great rap from Del Tha Funkee Homosapien obviously stands out and the polyrhythmic indie of ‘5/4’ is really cool, but other less-flashy tracks such as ‘Double Bass’ and ‘Latin Simone’ (with the aforementioned Ferrer) definitely deserve the attention too. And let’s not forget the hidden track, the raga refix of ‘Clint Eastwood’ by Ed Case, which rivals the original and is a great addition to almost any DJ set.

What a perfect debut album. Gorillaz seemed to come basically out of no-where, no-one really knew what it was all about, and the album keeps you guessing as to what’s going to come next. Nothing is what you expect, from start to end, but it’s exciting and enjoyable the whole way through. No wonder they went on to be huge.