Damon Albarn
Damon Albarn
Damon Albarn, OBE,is an English musician, singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist and record producer. He is the lead singer of the alternative rock band Blur as well as co-founder, vocalist, principal songwriter, and instrumentalist of the virtual band Gorillaz...
NationalityEnglish
ProfessionRock Singer
Date of Birth23 March 1968
CityWhitechapel, England
moving ideas cartoon
The cartoon is a metaphor really for the fact that it's almost impossible in our celebrity obsessed culture to move around genres and sort of change you ideas, change your face, you know?
I'm not a monarchist. But I'm English. And I have an irrational emotion for my country.
alex annoying bassist blur liked punch
On Blur bassist Alex James: I used to punch Alex a lot. He used to say really annoying things. I think he liked being punched.
I'm English, and I started off as a songwriter, so I can't really escape that - it's there.
leave
I never really want to leave it as an inspiration; I just can't get enough of it.
basic blur chords due guitar landscape record sing sort three
I can't really make another Blur record that's a big landscape sort of thing, due to my very basic guitar ability, ... I want to sing and play so it has to be three chords. I can only do three chords and not look at the guitar.
home heroin used
I used to go to work and take heroin in the studio and then stop when I came home,
writing years long
Trying to write music that's sensitive to 400 years ago takes a bit of madness, as it's such a long stretch of time.
thinking chinese trying
I'm an English songwriter/composer, working in Mandarin and trying to find something about Chinese culture that I really relate to and respect and feel some genuine emotions for - and it's quite hard, the pentatonic scale, and that, in a way, is why I think it works. Because I'm forced to limit myself to quite strict rules about what I did. Maybe that's how I avoided pastiche.
night one-day around-the-world
I have to wear a new T-shirt every night. I throw them into the audience. One day I'm going to go around the world and reclaim all my T-shirts
memories taken journey
I like to put my iPad on the window and leave it there for however long the journey is, so that I'm staring out, and it's staring out. We're kind of staring out together. It's very poetic to me, watching that absent-minded passing of time. You realize how much you've taken in. What is left of that memory of you staring out of the window for an hour? It's all on the iPad.
mean working-with-others musician
What you learn from working with other performers and musicians is invaluable, really, and can only help you grow. I mean, if you spend your whole life focusing on yourself, you're not really learning much.
albums needs break
I was going through a break up. I was depressed... I really did need to do something. Recording an album was a great escape. I don't know what would have happened if I wouldn't have started to work.
hippie punk grunge
If punk was about getting rid of hippies, then I'm getting rid of grunge.