Gorillaz (2010)
Interview Background
I don’t know if the teleconferencing operator fell asleep after connecting us, but my 15-minute phone interview with Gorillaz visual maestro Jamie Hewlett ended up stretching beyond half an hour. And what a fantastic interviewee he proved to be, erupting into cheeky Dickensian chuckles at regular intervals and only calling time on the interview when his Gorillaz co-creator, Damon Albarn, barged into his hotel room and starting buggerising around. Gorillaz’ Plastic Beach tour was the final large-scale outing by the cartoon group before the project entered something of a hiatus amid speculation Hewlett and Albarn had a falling out, but in this cover story there’s little sign of friction beyond some casual ribbing. A large amount of ground was covered, with a massive chunk of material going unpublished despite some of Hewlett’s revelations in this interview being reprinted around the globe. It’s been restored below.
The following is an edited version of an interview first published in Rip It Up, December 2010.
Gorillaz - Simian Mobile Disco
by Scott McLennan
Despite being offensively drunk at the time, Gorillaz co-creator Jamie Hewlett remembers when he and fellow Gorillaz troublemaker Damon Albarn first caught the attention of Snoop Dogg. The hip hop megastar, who has since worked with the band on their 2010 album Plastic Beach, was a few seats in front of the pair at the 2001 MTV Awards when Albarn caused a ruckus.
“We got quite drunk, fell asleep and were snoring in our seats, so every time they did the spectacular sweeping camera shot above the audience they had to change the angle of the camera crane to avoid us,” Hewlett recalls with a filthy chuckle. “We wake up to see Mudvayne taking to the stage in their white suits with fake bullet holes in their foreheads and blood all over their white suits. Damon says ‘Get off, ya cunt!’ really loudly, at which point everyone turned around and looked at us – Snoop Dogg and Christopher Walken were three seats in front of us – and we got up and left. We hadn’t wanted to do any of that anyway, so we got fucked off and just got drunk.”
The visual yin to Albarn’s sonic yang, Hewlett’s artwork, videos and designs have played a dynamic role in the success of Gorillaz as 21st century pop enigmas. In some ways the animated venture is a modern version of Alan Lomax’s field recording project, capturing disparate artists and presenting them in new formats. With the death of former Gorillaz collaborators Ike Turner and Dennis Hopper in recent years, it adds further depth to the project’s legacy.
“I can remember many years ago reading a comment where they asked Liam Gallagher what he thought of Gorillaz and he said something along the lines of ‘It’s a load of shit – it’s for kids’. And he’s absolutely right, it’s a large part of our audience, but if we’re getting kids into Bobby Womack and Ike Turner and Dennis Hopper because of us, then I’m very proud of that.”
Despite the fanbase including kids, the back stories Hewlett has created for his characters are deeply subversive - bassist Murdoc has dabbled with Nazi symbolism, Satanism and drug use. Not the sort of material you’d find in your average Saturday morning kids cartoon, then.
“Well it was never aimed at kids but I don’t think there’s anything in there that’s going to totally corrupt kids. I think Liam’s comment was made because a lot of people think if something’s animated it must be for kids, but I think that’s rubbish. Animation is an art form like any other and if done properly it can be enjoyed by everyone. I think music and animation go together so well, so if you’re a filmmaker or animator and you’re given a four-minute piece of music that’s really fucking great and you want to tell a story in those four minutes, then that’s a gift and you’d have to be doing well to really fuck it up.”
The way Gorillaz have toyed with the mainstream via avatars, weird worlds and surreal back stories is reminiscent of similarly subversive UK act The KLF 20 years ago.
“Yeah, I was a fan of The KLF actually. They were a bit more way out than us though! Their art-based music projects were really cool and I had a lot of respect for Bill Drummond. That’s part of my musical background though – that was way before Gorillaz of course, but you do absorb those sorts of things along the way and then they come out of a different hole (laughs) so you don’t even realise the influence they’ve had on you. Bands like Big Audio Dynamite, for instance: having Mick [Jones, BAD leader and The Clash’s guitarist] as part of Gorillaz for us is a real joy. Me and Damon are both huge Clash fans, but we loved Big Audio Dynamite’s use of film references and film quotes.”
After appearing together on Plastic Beach, Jones and The Clash’s bassist Paul Simonon are now a fixture of Gorillaz live shows.
“We all drink in the same pub in West London so we’ve known them for a while and they are like our mates now. It’s weird on this tour going into catering and there’s [De La Soul’s] Maseo having a huge bowl of porridge for his breakfast and Bobby Womack at the back having an egg. You do sort of go, ‘My God! What a peculiar thing we’ve pulled together here!’. They all enjoy being part of it and there are so many talented people on the tour yet there’s not one ego at all. Everyone’s great and there’s been so many fun times with lots of laughter.
“We sometimes get together in the dressing room after the show and everyone gets together and has a bit of a boogie,” Hewlett adds with a laugh. “I will always remember this fine time that I’ve spent in America.”
With an album worth of unreleased Gorillaz material, Plastic Beach isn’t the full stop early reports suggested.
“No, it’s not a full stop, but when we finish a Gorillaz album and campaign we’re usually quite exhausted. You usually have to go away and do something else for a while, which is why we’ve only made three albums in 10 years. Each one is three years in the making, so it’s good to do something different and come back with new and creative ideas. Gorillaz costs a lot of money to make and you have to sell records in order to justify doing it, so we’ll have to see what happens. Gorillaz might have to change even more, but it’s not a full stop.”
Next up is an Albarn/Hewlett project in the Congo.
“Oxfam want us to go to Congo and see what’s happening there and do a project based on that. I don’t know what it is yet - it will obviously be music and visuals - but we’ll have to experience it first and come back with an idea. We’re going with Oxfam, so they’ll look after us - and if they don’t it’s tough shit, isn’t it! I do like experiencing things like that as I do like to know what goes on in those parts of the world. When we did our gigs in Beirut and Damascus, Damon and I went out and did a recce and just experienced the place. Beirut was one of the most enjoyable cities I’ve ever been to in my life and the people were just incredible, and the same goes for Damascus. The idea you have of this part of the world thanks to the lies and rubbish you read in newspapers, you go there and you realise it’s not like that at all. The people are welcoming and it’s a wonderful culture, so I think it’s important to go to these places you haven’t been and see it for yourself. But hopefully we don’t have our heads chopped off…”
Plastic Beach (EMI)
Unpublished Interview Material
By the time Gorillaz makes it to the live arena, you’ve already spent month sweating it out in the art studio creating the detailed screen visuals that accompany the musicians. Do you ever get a hankering to come on stage and play a triangle or something, just so you can be involved in the live construct he helped create?
“Maybe I should get up and play a triangle! (laughs) I don’t do anything in the live show as my work is done, but since I spent quite a few months working on this I decided I might go on tour as well. It’s a once in a lifetime experience to be on tour with all these people and I’m not going to miss it, so I’m here and doing press. I’m drawing while I’m on tour and coming up with other stuff in the Gorillaz world, but at the same time I’m very much enjoying driving around America on a tour bus and experiencing the reaction of the audience, which has been incredible. It’s been five years since we came here for Demon Days and 10 years since we did a tour of America, so it’s been great. The audiences have been very excited to see us, which is a nice feeling.”
Charts and platinum sales tell one story, but it must be great to earn an instant response at a live show.
“There’s nothing like it. It’s a bit like a celebration because it’s quite an ‘up’ show and we have all these different people coming on stage, there are the visuals and the sound is incredible. Then you have the audience, who are all wearing sailor hats and stripy shirts, which is great. The audience is everyone from little kids to older people, so it’s a really interesting mix of people.”
As one of the UK’s foremost contemporary artists, have you ever crossed paths with Banksy? One of his stencil designs appeared on Blur’s Think Tank album cover of 2003…
“He’s an old friend of mine and Damon’s, we’ve known him for a long time. He’s great and I love what he does. He’s a very smart guy and he’s constantly adapting and changing, so I think that a lot of the stencil art that he started has been slightly ruined by other artists doing not as well as him, but he’s moved on. He’s doing things a lot differently to what he started out doing and he’s been nominated for an Oscar for Exit Via The Gift Shop (sic)… the bastard! But he’s great – he’s a very smart man.”
Maybe it’s time need to get the much-vaunted Terry Gilliam Gorillaz film project back off the ground if you’re hankering for an Oscar?
“Well that would be nice, but we shall see about that. Terry Gilliam’s always got so many films that he wants to make. We met with him and we all got excited about it but he already had about 10 projects he’d lined up to do. It was a brainstorming session and I can’t even remember what the project was now. We went out for dinner and spoke about it and became very friendly with him. He’s a very nice man and his films are incredible, but he had so many things on the go already. We’ll get back to it eventually, but if not then that’s the way it is.”
What was the background to Bruce Willis offering his services for the Stylo music clip?
“A good friend of ours came out to Paris when we did the Monkey opera. He asked us if he could bring a friend and we said, ‘Sure. What’s his name and we’ll put him on the guestlist?’ It was Bruce Willis! Bruce came along, sat next to me and loved it. We went out partying around Paris with him afterwards and had a very fun evening, then six months later he was in London and called me up. We went out for another fun evening and got to know him, so when we wanted to make this video I just emailed his assistant and Bruce said he’d love to do it. He didn’t charge us any money either, bless him. He’s great. He’s very down to earth and a fun person.”
When you were sharing a London pad with Albarn at the height of Britpop, it sounds like your parties were suitably massive.
“What do you mean ‘it sounds like’? Do you have massive parties?”
Well I don’t have Spice Girls and Radiohead around to my place…
(Laughs) “Well that was a particularly freaky night and I don’t quite know what happened that night. The house was suddenly filled with a peculiar collection of people from Marianne Faithfull to Spice Girls to a member of Radiohead – one of those ones I can’t remember, a background guy who isn’t Thom Yorke. I was quite drunk at the time but it was all very strange. We left the front door open and there were loads of paparazzi outside too, but none of them ever thought to come in.”
With all these guests - and David Bowie apparently subsequently on the phone trying to get an invite to your next party - I’m surprised none have appeared on a Gorillaz album yet?
“Damon was going to do something with David Bowie, who left a wonderful answer message on our phone when we were sharing a flat. [impressive impersonation] ‘Hello Damon, it’s David Bowie here… I’d love to talk to you about doing a project… aowww…’ We were going to keep that message because it was a really funny message. It was wiped though, which was a real shame. Unfortunately that project didn’t materialise either.”
A sign that these subversive creations have been a massive success is that Murdoc’s Wikipedia entry is longer than your own – you must have an awful lot of fun creating the characters’ back stories?
(Laughs) “Do I have a Wikipedia site? Well of course Murdoc’s is longer, because he’s more interesting than me. I didn’t know I had a Wikipedia site, but apparently I’ve got a Facebook site despite the fact it’s not me doing it – it’s somebody else pretending to be me. I don’t do all those things though – MyFace and all that.”
What did Mick and Paul think of their animated selves in On Melancholy Hill?
(Laughs) “They thought it was so funny.”
Is the shark-shaped sub in the On Melancholy Hill video a Tintin reference?
“Possibly, yes. I just thought a shark sub would be cool, but I’d forgotten about Tintin.”
Do you put a lot of in-jokes in the visuals just for Damon and vice versa with Damon’s lyrics?
“Yeah definitely – stuff creeps in there sometimes, but don’t ask me to name one off the top of my head. You have to remember that [Gorillaz drummer] Cass Browne writes a lot of the dialogue for the characters and we sit around working out what we want to have happen in the stories. Cass is incredibly funny and relatively sharp and intelligent and quick-witted, so he tends to put a lot of stuff in based on in-jokes.”
When Gorillaz stops for a while Damon heads off and works on his other projects, do you see yourself as the second wife and Blur as the first wife Damon still has to see every now and then because of the shared custody of musical children?
“No! (laughs) We share a studio and Damon has many projects I’m not a part of, but we get together for Gorillaz because that works. We did the Monkey opera and that was a lot of fun, spending a lot of time in China and learning new stuff. We’re doing another opera together next year, so what I do with him is a lot different to what he does with Blur, since it’s a completely different creative collaboration. I’m not a musician, but when musicians get together they really enjoy each other’s company. When Damon and Graham [Coxon, Blur guitarist] get together they get very excited and passionate about music, whereas I don’t have a musical bone in my body and we don’t really talk about work. We’re just mates who hang out and it’s a lot different to when you get a bunch of musicians in a room.”
You’ve spoken about how the 3D Gorillaz performance at the Grammys with Madonna caused you major headaches – but was there any enjoyment in being able to boss Madonna around and tell her exactly what she had to do?
“No (chuckles). There was no enjoyment in that at all. It looked great on the telly, that, but being there in the live experience it was terrible because they couldn’t turn the volume up because of the invisible holographic screen. It was very quiet.”
Did you have to speak with Madonna beforehand about how to interact with Murdoc and 2D though?
“No, I didn’t speak to Madonna at all. I just kind of storyboarded an idea and she came and did her own thing and knew what she was doing. She had been in a different part of the world and I don’t think it was possible for me to go and see her before, so she did her little dance and we animated the characters around her.”
Damon said that Dennis Hopper put on a fantastic pre-Grammys party that year with people like Al Pacino sitting in a corner?
“It was all of Dennis’ mates – and obviously he knows everybody – so I seem to remember seeing Matt Dillon, Lawrence Fishburne, Beck was there… it was ridiculous. Everyone you can think of was around at Dennis’ house and we were all having a wonderful time.”
You said you find it hard talking to musicians since you’re not musical, so how do you go having a chat to these Hollywood A-listers?
“It depends on the person, you know. If they’re talkative then it’s fine, but some people are very hard to talk to whether they’re A-list Hollywood stars or not. When I say I can’t talk to musicians, I can talk to musicians, just not about music. When they come off stage and they’re all pumped up and talking about chord changes I slope off into the back room with a bottle of rum…”
The screen appears to have come down a lot with the promotion of Plastic Beach this year, with you guys coming out of the shadows to do interviews rather than the characters. Do you feel the 2D and 3D universes have collapsed on each other or are they living in harmony now?
“Well the characters have been doing the interviews, but we’ve had to share that responsibility. The original idea behind Gorillaz was that we’d hide behind these characters, but the moment Damon decided he would sing that idea fell to pieces because everyone knows his voice. It’s been very difficult to balance that out because certain people don’t want to talk to the characters. Some magazines are happy to collaborate on little schemes with the characters and we’ve done a lot of that with this album, but there are certain places and people who don’t want to talk to the characters. Not everyone embraces this idea! (laughs)”
I always felt it must be fun for you to let your troublemaker id loose and say things that are abrasive and offensive that you’d never usually say?
“Absolutely, and you can have some real fun with that. Cass has always taken the responsibility of writing a lot of those interviews and I’ll read through them before they’re sent off. I’m always in hysterics, more so than if I was reading an interview with Bono or Chris Martin, do you know what I mean? They’re genuinely funny and to me I don’t understand it when people don’t want to talk to the cartoon characters, since most pop stars are cartoon characters.”
Well as Murdoc has said himself, “All bands ultimately invent themselves”.
“Exactly, so that’s my opinion.”
Noodle was originally devised as a slut called Paula – how much back-story do you create for these characters as you’re fleshing them out in the art studio?
(laughs) “Well I’ve been sat there sweating away for 25 years, so there’s always lots of back story that gets kicked out or isn’t appropriate. She was going to be a slut called Paula, but Damon didn’t like her. Noodle was created instead, so everyone seemed to like her. [Knocking] Hello? Hang on a minute, there’s someone at my door… Sorry, that was Damon coming in.”
Well to finalise the interview and with Damon in the room, I’m wondering what your favourite Blur song is?
[To Damon] “My favourite Blur song is…. Beetlebum.”
And I’m sure you’re someone who knows the back-story better than anyone considering you were friends with Justine and Damon for so long…
“I don’t know what you’re talking about… (laughs) I have to go now as Damon is in my room and distracting me. Lovely to talk to you mate, thank you. Take care.”
I don’t know if the teleconferencing operator fell asleep after connecting us, but my 15-minute phone interview with Gorillaz visual maestro Jamie Hewlett ended up stretching beyond half an hour. And what a fantastic interviewee he proved to be, erupting into cheeky Dickensian chuckles at regular intervals and only calling time on the interview when his Gorillaz co-creator, Damon Albarn, barged into his hotel room and starting buggerising around. Gorillaz’ Plastic Beach tour was the final large-scale outing by the cartoon group before the project entered something of a hiatus amid speculation Hewlett and Albarn had a falling out, but in this cover story there’s little sign of friction beyond some casual ribbing. A large amount of ground was covered, with a massive chunk of material going unpublished despite some of Hewlett’s revelations in this interview being reprinted around the globe. It’s been restored below.
The following is an edited version of an interview first published in Rip It Up, December 2010.
Gorillaz - Simian Mobile Disco
by Scott McLennan
Despite being offensively drunk at the time, Gorillaz co-creator Jamie Hewlett remembers when he and fellow Gorillaz troublemaker Damon Albarn first caught the attention of Snoop Dogg. The hip hop megastar, who has since worked with the band on their 2010 album Plastic Beach, was a few seats in front of the pair at the 2001 MTV Awards when Albarn caused a ruckus.
“We got quite drunk, fell asleep and were snoring in our seats, so every time they did the spectacular sweeping camera shot above the audience they had to change the angle of the camera crane to avoid us,” Hewlett recalls with a filthy chuckle. “We wake up to see Mudvayne taking to the stage in their white suits with fake bullet holes in their foreheads and blood all over their white suits. Damon says ‘Get off, ya cunt!’ really loudly, at which point everyone turned around and looked at us – Snoop Dogg and Christopher Walken were three seats in front of us – and we got up and left. We hadn’t wanted to do any of that anyway, so we got fucked off and just got drunk.”
The visual yin to Albarn’s sonic yang, Hewlett’s artwork, videos and designs have played a dynamic role in the success of Gorillaz as 21st century pop enigmas. In some ways the animated venture is a modern version of Alan Lomax’s field recording project, capturing disparate artists and presenting them in new formats. With the death of former Gorillaz collaborators Ike Turner and Dennis Hopper in recent years, it adds further depth to the project’s legacy.
“I can remember many years ago reading a comment where they asked Liam Gallagher what he thought of Gorillaz and he said something along the lines of ‘It’s a load of shit – it’s for kids’. And he’s absolutely right, it’s a large part of our audience, but if we’re getting kids into Bobby Womack and Ike Turner and Dennis Hopper because of us, then I’m very proud of that.”
Despite the fanbase including kids, the back stories Hewlett has created for his characters are deeply subversive - bassist Murdoc has dabbled with Nazi symbolism, Satanism and drug use. Not the sort of material you’d find in your average Saturday morning kids cartoon, then.
“Well it was never aimed at kids but I don’t think there’s anything in there that’s going to totally corrupt kids. I think Liam’s comment was made because a lot of people think if something’s animated it must be for kids, but I think that’s rubbish. Animation is an art form like any other and if done properly it can be enjoyed by everyone. I think music and animation go together so well, so if you’re a filmmaker or animator and you’re given a four-minute piece of music that’s really fucking great and you want to tell a story in those four minutes, then that’s a gift and you’d have to be doing well to really fuck it up.”
The way Gorillaz have toyed with the mainstream via avatars, weird worlds and surreal back stories is reminiscent of similarly subversive UK act The KLF 20 years ago.
“Yeah, I was a fan of The KLF actually. They were a bit more way out than us though! Their art-based music projects were really cool and I had a lot of respect for Bill Drummond. That’s part of my musical background though – that was way before Gorillaz of course, but you do absorb those sorts of things along the way and then they come out of a different hole (laughs) so you don’t even realise the influence they’ve had on you. Bands like Big Audio Dynamite, for instance: having Mick [Jones, BAD leader and The Clash’s guitarist] as part of Gorillaz for us is a real joy. Me and Damon are both huge Clash fans, but we loved Big Audio Dynamite’s use of film references and film quotes.”
After appearing together on Plastic Beach, Jones and The Clash’s bassist Paul Simonon are now a fixture of Gorillaz live shows.
“We all drink in the same pub in West London so we’ve known them for a while and they are like our mates now. It’s weird on this tour going into catering and there’s [De La Soul’s] Maseo having a huge bowl of porridge for his breakfast and Bobby Womack at the back having an egg. You do sort of go, ‘My God! What a peculiar thing we’ve pulled together here!’. They all enjoy being part of it and there are so many talented people on the tour yet there’s not one ego at all. Everyone’s great and there’s been so many fun times with lots of laughter.
“We sometimes get together in the dressing room after the show and everyone gets together and has a bit of a boogie,” Hewlett adds with a laugh. “I will always remember this fine time that I’ve spent in America.”
With an album worth of unreleased Gorillaz material, Plastic Beach isn’t the full stop early reports suggested.
“No, it’s not a full stop, but when we finish a Gorillaz album and campaign we’re usually quite exhausted. You usually have to go away and do something else for a while, which is why we’ve only made three albums in 10 years. Each one is three years in the making, so it’s good to do something different and come back with new and creative ideas. Gorillaz costs a lot of money to make and you have to sell records in order to justify doing it, so we’ll have to see what happens. Gorillaz might have to change even more, but it’s not a full stop.”
Next up is an Albarn/Hewlett project in the Congo.
“Oxfam want us to go to Congo and see what’s happening there and do a project based on that. I don’t know what it is yet - it will obviously be music and visuals - but we’ll have to experience it first and come back with an idea. We’re going with Oxfam, so they’ll look after us - and if they don’t it’s tough shit, isn’t it! I do like experiencing things like that as I do like to know what goes on in those parts of the world. When we did our gigs in Beirut and Damascus, Damon and I went out and did a recce and just experienced the place. Beirut was one of the most enjoyable cities I’ve ever been to in my life and the people were just incredible, and the same goes for Damascus. The idea you have of this part of the world thanks to the lies and rubbish you read in newspapers, you go there and you realise it’s not like that at all. The people are welcoming and it’s a wonderful culture, so I think it’s important to go to these places you haven’t been and see it for yourself. But hopefully we don’t have our heads chopped off…”
Plastic Beach (EMI)
Unpublished Interview Material
By the time Gorillaz makes it to the live arena, you’ve already spent month sweating it out in the art studio creating the detailed screen visuals that accompany the musicians. Do you ever get a hankering to come on stage and play a triangle or something, just so you can be involved in the live construct he helped create?
“Maybe I should get up and play a triangle! (laughs) I don’t do anything in the live show as my work is done, but since I spent quite a few months working on this I decided I might go on tour as well. It’s a once in a lifetime experience to be on tour with all these people and I’m not going to miss it, so I’m here and doing press. I’m drawing while I’m on tour and coming up with other stuff in the Gorillaz world, but at the same time I’m very much enjoying driving around America on a tour bus and experiencing the reaction of the audience, which has been incredible. It’s been five years since we came here for Demon Days and 10 years since we did a tour of America, so it’s been great. The audiences have been very excited to see us, which is a nice feeling.”
Charts and platinum sales tell one story, but it must be great to earn an instant response at a live show.
“There’s nothing like it. It’s a bit like a celebration because it’s quite an ‘up’ show and we have all these different people coming on stage, there are the visuals and the sound is incredible. Then you have the audience, who are all wearing sailor hats and stripy shirts, which is great. The audience is everyone from little kids to older people, so it’s a really interesting mix of people.”
As one of the UK’s foremost contemporary artists, have you ever crossed paths with Banksy? One of his stencil designs appeared on Blur’s Think Tank album cover of 2003…
“He’s an old friend of mine and Damon’s, we’ve known him for a long time. He’s great and I love what he does. He’s a very smart guy and he’s constantly adapting and changing, so I think that a lot of the stencil art that he started has been slightly ruined by other artists doing not as well as him, but he’s moved on. He’s doing things a lot differently to what he started out doing and he’s been nominated for an Oscar for Exit Via The Gift Shop (sic)… the bastard! But he’s great – he’s a very smart man.”
Maybe it’s time need to get the much-vaunted Terry Gilliam Gorillaz film project back off the ground if you’re hankering for an Oscar?
“Well that would be nice, but we shall see about that. Terry Gilliam’s always got so many films that he wants to make. We met with him and we all got excited about it but he already had about 10 projects he’d lined up to do. It was a brainstorming session and I can’t even remember what the project was now. We went out for dinner and spoke about it and became very friendly with him. He’s a very nice man and his films are incredible, but he had so many things on the go already. We’ll get back to it eventually, but if not then that’s the way it is.”
What was the background to Bruce Willis offering his services for the Stylo music clip?
“A good friend of ours came out to Paris when we did the Monkey opera. He asked us if he could bring a friend and we said, ‘Sure. What’s his name and we’ll put him on the guestlist?’ It was Bruce Willis! Bruce came along, sat next to me and loved it. We went out partying around Paris with him afterwards and had a very fun evening, then six months later he was in London and called me up. We went out for another fun evening and got to know him, so when we wanted to make this video I just emailed his assistant and Bruce said he’d love to do it. He didn’t charge us any money either, bless him. He’s great. He’s very down to earth and a fun person.”
When you were sharing a London pad with Albarn at the height of Britpop, it sounds like your parties were suitably massive.
“What do you mean ‘it sounds like’? Do you have massive parties?”
Well I don’t have Spice Girls and Radiohead around to my place…
(Laughs) “Well that was a particularly freaky night and I don’t quite know what happened that night. The house was suddenly filled with a peculiar collection of people from Marianne Faithfull to Spice Girls to a member of Radiohead – one of those ones I can’t remember, a background guy who isn’t Thom Yorke. I was quite drunk at the time but it was all very strange. We left the front door open and there were loads of paparazzi outside too, but none of them ever thought to come in.”
With all these guests - and David Bowie apparently subsequently on the phone trying to get an invite to your next party - I’m surprised none have appeared on a Gorillaz album yet?
“Damon was going to do something with David Bowie, who left a wonderful answer message on our phone when we were sharing a flat. [impressive impersonation] ‘Hello Damon, it’s David Bowie here… I’d love to talk to you about doing a project… aowww…’ We were going to keep that message because it was a really funny message. It was wiped though, which was a real shame. Unfortunately that project didn’t materialise either.”
A sign that these subversive creations have been a massive success is that Murdoc’s Wikipedia entry is longer than your own – you must have an awful lot of fun creating the characters’ back stories?
(Laughs) “Do I have a Wikipedia site? Well of course Murdoc’s is longer, because he’s more interesting than me. I didn’t know I had a Wikipedia site, but apparently I’ve got a Facebook site despite the fact it’s not me doing it – it’s somebody else pretending to be me. I don’t do all those things though – MyFace and all that.”
What did Mick and Paul think of their animated selves in On Melancholy Hill?
(Laughs) “They thought it was so funny.”
Is the shark-shaped sub in the On Melancholy Hill video a Tintin reference?
“Possibly, yes. I just thought a shark sub would be cool, but I’d forgotten about Tintin.”
Do you put a lot of in-jokes in the visuals just for Damon and vice versa with Damon’s lyrics?
“Yeah definitely – stuff creeps in there sometimes, but don’t ask me to name one off the top of my head. You have to remember that [Gorillaz drummer] Cass Browne writes a lot of the dialogue for the characters and we sit around working out what we want to have happen in the stories. Cass is incredibly funny and relatively sharp and intelligent and quick-witted, so he tends to put a lot of stuff in based on in-jokes.”
When Gorillaz stops for a while Damon heads off and works on his other projects, do you see yourself as the second wife and Blur as the first wife Damon still has to see every now and then because of the shared custody of musical children?
“No! (laughs) We share a studio and Damon has many projects I’m not a part of, but we get together for Gorillaz because that works. We did the Monkey opera and that was a lot of fun, spending a lot of time in China and learning new stuff. We’re doing another opera together next year, so what I do with him is a lot different to what he does with Blur, since it’s a completely different creative collaboration. I’m not a musician, but when musicians get together they really enjoy each other’s company. When Damon and Graham [Coxon, Blur guitarist] get together they get very excited and passionate about music, whereas I don’t have a musical bone in my body and we don’t really talk about work. We’re just mates who hang out and it’s a lot different to when you get a bunch of musicians in a room.”
You’ve spoken about how the 3D Gorillaz performance at the Grammys with Madonna caused you major headaches – but was there any enjoyment in being able to boss Madonna around and tell her exactly what she had to do?
“No (chuckles). There was no enjoyment in that at all. It looked great on the telly, that, but being there in the live experience it was terrible because they couldn’t turn the volume up because of the invisible holographic screen. It was very quiet.”
Did you have to speak with Madonna beforehand about how to interact with Murdoc and 2D though?
“No, I didn’t speak to Madonna at all. I just kind of storyboarded an idea and she came and did her own thing and knew what she was doing. She had been in a different part of the world and I don’t think it was possible for me to go and see her before, so she did her little dance and we animated the characters around her.”
Damon said that Dennis Hopper put on a fantastic pre-Grammys party that year with people like Al Pacino sitting in a corner?
“It was all of Dennis’ mates – and obviously he knows everybody – so I seem to remember seeing Matt Dillon, Lawrence Fishburne, Beck was there… it was ridiculous. Everyone you can think of was around at Dennis’ house and we were all having a wonderful time.”
You said you find it hard talking to musicians since you’re not musical, so how do you go having a chat to these Hollywood A-listers?
“It depends on the person, you know. If they’re talkative then it’s fine, but some people are very hard to talk to whether they’re A-list Hollywood stars or not. When I say I can’t talk to musicians, I can talk to musicians, just not about music. When they come off stage and they’re all pumped up and talking about chord changes I slope off into the back room with a bottle of rum…”
The screen appears to have come down a lot with the promotion of Plastic Beach this year, with you guys coming out of the shadows to do interviews rather than the characters. Do you feel the 2D and 3D universes have collapsed on each other or are they living in harmony now?
“Well the characters have been doing the interviews, but we’ve had to share that responsibility. The original idea behind Gorillaz was that we’d hide behind these characters, but the moment Damon decided he would sing that idea fell to pieces because everyone knows his voice. It’s been very difficult to balance that out because certain people don’t want to talk to the characters. Some magazines are happy to collaborate on little schemes with the characters and we’ve done a lot of that with this album, but there are certain places and people who don’t want to talk to the characters. Not everyone embraces this idea! (laughs)”
I always felt it must be fun for you to let your troublemaker id loose and say things that are abrasive and offensive that you’d never usually say?
“Absolutely, and you can have some real fun with that. Cass has always taken the responsibility of writing a lot of those interviews and I’ll read through them before they’re sent off. I’m always in hysterics, more so than if I was reading an interview with Bono or Chris Martin, do you know what I mean? They’re genuinely funny and to me I don’t understand it when people don’t want to talk to the cartoon characters, since most pop stars are cartoon characters.”
Well as Murdoc has said himself, “All bands ultimately invent themselves”.
“Exactly, so that’s my opinion.”
Noodle was originally devised as a slut called Paula – how much back-story do you create for these characters as you’re fleshing them out in the art studio?
(laughs) “Well I’ve been sat there sweating away for 25 years, so there’s always lots of back story that gets kicked out or isn’t appropriate. She was going to be a slut called Paula, but Damon didn’t like her. Noodle was created instead, so everyone seemed to like her. [Knocking] Hello? Hang on a minute, there’s someone at my door… Sorry, that was Damon coming in.”
Well to finalise the interview and with Damon in the room, I’m wondering what your favourite Blur song is?
[To Damon] “My favourite Blur song is…. Beetlebum.”
And I’m sure you’re someone who knows the back-story better than anyone considering you were friends with Justine and Damon for so long…
“I don’t know what you’re talking about… (laughs) I have to go now as Damon is in my room and distracting me. Lovely to talk to you mate, thank you. Take care.”
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