Gorillaz arrived in 2001 as a provocation: a fictional band of cartoon misfits fronted by Murdoc, 2-D, Noodle, and Russel, conjured by Blur frontman Damon Albarn and Tank Girl co-creator Jamie Hewlett. The conceit was never really a gimmick. It was an escape hatch, a way to make music free of rockstar ego and genre gravity. What poured out was a restless hybrid of hip-hop, dub, electronic, post-punk, and melody so simple it ached. The through-line across every album and collaboration is a low-grade melancholy, a feeling of drifting through a hyperpop world with your eyes wide open and your headphones in. Fans of Gorillaz tend to share a specific sensibility: they love music that sounds like it was made just slightly outside the mainstream, they are drawn to animated worlds that feel lived-in rather than clean, and they will follow a creator they trust into almost any medium.
Essential Gorillaz
The albums, in the order a new fan should hear them
If You Love the Cartoon Dimension
Animated films and series with the same punk-art, anti-corporate, outsider spirit
If You Love the Dystopian Funk
Films and series with the same bruised-city, hip-hop-inflected, end-of-days atmosphere
If You Love Music Games and Rhythm Worlds
Games that live at the intersection of sound, spectacle, and identity
If You Love the Literary DNA
Novels and music books that share the restless genre-blending spirit
Demon Days is the Perfect Album
Released in 2005, Demon Days did what almost no record manages: it made dread feel comfortable. From the opening static of 'Last Living Souls' to De La Soul's turn on 'Feel Good Inc.' to the orchestral swell of 'Don't Get Lost in Heaven,' the whole record moves like a late-night drive through a city you're not sure is real. It is not a pop album that snuck in some hip-hop, or a hip-hop album with a rock edge. It is something weirder, something that sounds like all those genres heard through a wall at 2am. Nothing before or since sounds quite like it.
Plastic Beach Was the First Great Climate Grief Record
Before 'climate anxiety' became a media category, Gorillaz built an entire island out of trash and set their third album there. Plastic Beach (2010) is a concept record about consumption, waste, and the beautiful garbage we make of the world, wrapped in the most lush, orchestrated production the band had attempted. Snoop Dogg floats through on a sun-drenched track, Lou Reed brings the grit, and underneath all of it is Albarn's unshakeable sadness. It did not get the credit it deserved at the time. It gets more every year.
Jamie Hewlett is as Important as the Music
You cannot separate Gorillaz from Jamie Hewlett's visual world. The band members are cartoon characters who age, who have backstories, who star in animated videos and webisodes. Hewlett built an entire mythology out of pen and ink, one that gives the music a place to live. His work sits in a lineage from Tank Girl and 2000 AD through manga and underground comics, and it elevated what might have been a clever art-school joke into something with genuine emotional weight. The graphic novel 'Gorillaz: Rise of the Ogre' is required reading for anyone who wants to understand what the project actually is.
The Now Now Proved Gorillaz Could Be Quiet
After the overloaded guest-list sprawl of Humanz, The Now Now (2018) arrived as an act of restraint. Almost no featured artists. Shorter songs. Synthesizers instead of orchestras. It is the most introverted Gorillaz record and, for many fans, the most intimate. 'Hollywood,' 'Idaho,' and 'Tranz' are as direct as the band has ever been. It proved the project was not dependent on spectacle and that Albarn, when left close to alone, makes music that quietly devastates.
Gorillaz: A Cross-Media Life
- 1998Jamie Hewlett and Damon Albarn conceive the virtual band concept while sharing a flat in London
- 2001Self-titled debut released; 'Clint Eastwood' becomes an international hit Gorillaz
- 2003G-Sides and the animated 'Phase One: Celebrity Takedown' multimedia book published D‐Sides
- 2005Demon Days; the 'Feel Good Inc.' video wins a Grammy for Best Music Video Demon Days
- 2006D-Sides B-sides collection; massive Demon Days Live at the Manchester Opera House concert D‐Sides
- 2007Rise of the Ogre graphic novel biography published by Riverhead Books
- 2008Bananaz documentary film by Ceri Levy released, covering the Demon Days era Banana
- 2010Plastic Beach, the concept album set on an island of trash, with the Escape to Plastic Beach world tour Plastic Beach
- 2011The Fall recorded entirely on an iPad during the North American tour; given away free on Christmas Day The Fall
- 2017Humanz, a party-at-the-end-of-the-world double album; Gorillaz return after a six-year hiatus Humanz
- 2018The Now Now, a quieter solo-ish record; the band headline Glastonbury The Now Now
- 2020Song Machine, Season One, released as episodic monthly singles throughout the pandemic year Song Machine, Season One: Strange Timez
- 2022Cracker Island announced; Gorillaz host their own Demon Dayz festival across multiple years Cracker Island
- 2023Cracker Island released; Gorillaz: Almanac art book published by Z2 Comics Cracker Island
Cartoon outlaws and dystopian funk
Cyberpunk & Dystopia
Explore the Cyberpunk & Dystopia guide →We are not a real band. But the music is real. The feeling is real. That is the only thing that matters.Damon Albarn