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Back to: Archive · 2006 Interview with Damon Albarn. Words: Garry Mulholland. Photo: Jason Joyce. From Q magazine, cover date: November 2006.   Q: How are you? Damon: I'm very busy. But much further on than I was last year in the eternal quest to be a rounded, genuine, nice person. Where are you right now? I'm in the auditorium of the Apollo in Harlem. What does Q mean to you? Q's been there longer than most, and it's a good format. But I don't buy music magazines. What were you doing 20 years ago? I was 18 so I was probably worrying far too much about my hair. And playing a gig with [early band] Real Lives at Stanway comprehensive school in Colchester. Graham [Coxon, former Blur guitarist] was on drums. What's your high point of the last 20 years? My daughter Missy. And the low point? I don't want to get into all of that. I've been self-destructive over the years. Anyone who's interested in me will have a rough idea that I've kept a lot of things quiet. I choose not to define my low points. Will you ever write the no-holds-barred autobiography? Even though I say so myself, I think I've had an incredibly interesting life. But I'm too conscious about everybody else involved. What was it like working with Dennis Hopper on Gorillaz's Demon Days? He's a fabulous man. The only reason I went to the Grammys this year is because he put on this incredible party for us the night before. He has this wonderful house on Venice Beach which is like a live-in art museum. And Al Pacino's in the corner having a casual drink. What was the first album you bought on CD? Dunno. It wouldn't be an honest answer because I'd just choose something that sounded cool. And the first track you downloaded? I've never downloaded anything. I don't know how to. I'll listen to the excerpt and then go and find the record. Who's your favourite artist of the last 20 years? There isn't one favourite, but the way it happened for Ibrahim Ferrer [Cuban singer rediscovered by Ry Cooder for the Buena Vista Social Club album] was amazing. It was one of the fairy tales of our time. If you could talk to yourself 20 years ago, what advice would you give? Stay away from the late nights, drugs and fast women. Really? No. Honestly... don't let people bully you into things you don't want to do. Try to be true to yourself. Your favourite drug of the last 20 years? The most inspiring drug has been marijuana. Yes, I have taken drugs. But marijuana has stayed with me, and I love to smoke while I'm making music. The process is accompanied by a haze. Your best and worst haircut? I'm not answering that. It's a stupid question. What was the most money you spent? What do you want to know - whether I'm rich or not? Are you? I'm a little bit rich. What else have you been up to? I've just completed an album [The Good, The Bad And The Queen] with [Afrobeat drummer] Tony Allen and [ex-Clash bassist] Paul Simonon. I'm also working on an opera about [cult '70s TV show] Monkey, which is a classic piece of literature in China. And there's a musical I'm writing for the National Theatre. It started off being about 50 years of London music. But I'm determined to let it evolve. I know how it starts, but not how it finishes. And Blur? I'm really committed to Blur, too, but I'd really just like it to be four people again. I hated playing old Blur songs without Graham on the Think Tank tour. Am I saying no more Blur records unless Graham comes back? No. But it's got to be something really brash and stupid. There are real problems to be overcome before I feel right about it. Where will you be in 20 minutes? Thinking about eating something small before I go onstage. In "The Top 50 Essential Tracks To Download This Month", The Good, The Bad And The Queen's debut single "Herculean" was rated Number One. Q described it thus: "Spacey, atmospheric first release from Damon Albarn's new band. Much like Blur's weirder moments - think the ballads off 13 - or even, whisper it, Radiohead." In the top 20 albums of the last 20 years countdown, Gorillaz's "Demon Days" was voted number 20: "Surpassing even Blur's creative and commercial peaks, Damon Albarn threw the London Community Gospel Choir, Shaun Ryder and Dennis Hopper into the mix on this modern classic. Also introduced the wider world to Danger Mouse, a talent you suspect is just getting started." In the top 20 singles of the last 20 years countdown, Blur's "Song 2" was voted number 11: "Song 2 saw Blur shrewdly reinvented. Out went clever-clever Britpop waggishness and in came this benchmark of lo-fi/high-octane alternative rock. In a stroke, Blur's career was saved. Until Gorillaz, that is."  Danny Eccleston contributed the following recollection: Southampton, 1999 For a cover feature to commemorate the release of Blur's "not bad" sixth album, 13, the band's PRs went to town in their offer of "colour" - those entertaining incidents that enliven a band interview. Your correspondent got to hang with Alex James and Britain's foremost astronomers and - more dangerously - escape from a helicopter-crash simulator with drummer Dave Rowntree, a qualified pilot. This involved being strapped into a small metal box that was then violently submerged in water and turned upside down as liquid rushed into every orifice. All safety procedure and sangfroid deserted me as I, Rowntree and PR Louise Butterly fought to squeeze ourselves out of a tiny hatch, during which process Butterly sustained a stinging blow to the head (was I or Rowntree to blame? We're not saying). Afterwards, Rowntree decreed the savage, disorientating experience to be "not unlike being in Blur for the last 10 years. Only less life-threatening." After that, my Q assignments became exclusively land-based. In the reviews section, the Gorillaz autobiography "Rise Of The Ogre" is reviewed. Q give it 4 out of five stars, with reviewer Johnny Davis commenting: "Gorillaz might have been part-conceived as a means of stepping back from frontman chores but Damon Albarn has overcompensated everywhere else. Each Gorillaz project is more mind-bogglingly ambitious than the last. Accordingly, this autobiography is mammoth; generous in text and with Jamie Hewlett's wonderful artwork. From Murdoc's birth in 'the stinking borough of Stoke-on-Trent' to Gorillaz moving to LA's Mulholland Drive in 2002, the made-up band's made-up story - as 'told' to live drummer Cass Browne - is rendered in Spinal Tap richness. Music to the eyes. Essential quote: 'The truth is cheaper than fiction' - Murdoc." In the "Last Track I Loved" feature, Manic Street Preachers bassist Nicky Wire said: "I fall back in love with Beetlebum ever year, it could've been on The Beatles' White Album. Everything is implied: doomed love, drugs, decadence. It's the song that made me realise Damon Albarn is a genius." |