1 week ago
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Gorillaz are 25. In 2000, this cartoon-fronted project seemed like something fun for Damon Albarn to do between Blur albums, hiding behind Jamie Hewlett’s comic-book animations, but they’ve overtaken Blur almost everywhere but Britain. The number of children in the audience testifies to Gorillaz’s powers of self-rejuvenation – an ever-changing vehicle for Albarn’s ceaseless curiosity.
Gorillaz are marking the occasion with an immersive exhibition, House of Kong, and four era-specific shows. This second night revives 2005’s Demon Days. Co-produced by Danger Mouse, it remains the most satisfying expression of the Gorillaz concept: focused in both its themes (innocence and violence) and personnel (rappers and the rap-adjacent). Dressed like a hip vicar, Albarn serves double duty as a frontman and a conscientious host, although the original cast of vocalists is inevitably depleted. The late MF DOOM and awol Shaun Ryder appear only on screen, while Skye Edwards replaces Martina Topley-Bird on All Alone. Thank goodness for the old-school stalwarts. Bootie Brown enters Dirty Harry like a red-and-white firework before De La Soul boom and cackle through Feel Good Inc.
Straight replication, though, is not the point. Beneath Hewlett’s helter-skelter videos, the band, choir and string quartet give the songs new mass and drama. O Green World builds to a startling frenzy and the climactic title track blossoms gloriously. As stained-glass windows fill the screen and the London Community Gospel Choir chant the cathartic refrain, “To the sun”, Albarn’s vicar gear suddenly makes sense. The encore of three contemporary B-sides, while admirably disciplined, is somewhat anticlimactic. The luminous Hong Kong, starring the guzheng virtuoso Qing Du, ends the night on a melancholy question mark rather than an exclamation point.
Then again, the singles notwithstanding, Demon Days isn’t exactly a party record. This product of the Bush-and-Blair years was pitched as “the world in a state of night,” drawing inspiration from horror soundtracks and the Specials’ queasy crisis-pop. The show opens with a wartorn newsreel montage and sporadically drenches the crowd in hell-red light. For obvious reasons, the album’s haunting protest against humanity’s appetite for destruction – of people and planet alike – sounds no less apt tonight. Demon days are here again.
