Damon Albarn/Blur, Day 4

Yesterday saw the release of The Good, The Bad & The Queen's self titled album. The band features Damon Albarn, Tony Allen (Drummer, Fela Kuti), Paul Simonon (Bass, The Clash), Simon Tong (Guitar, The Verve), and Danger Mouse (Producer, Gnarls Barkley).

So far, I have no major problems with this album. It's not brilliant by any means but the songs have been fun to listen to. I've come away digging the bass sounds that Simonon provided. The album shipped gold in the U.K. which is not really a big surprise. It probably won't do as well over here, but the band is playing Coachella so I guess they will be a semi-hip thing.

Check out All Music Guide's review here.

The following tracks are the first on the album and then the leadoff single.

History Song
Herculean

Damon Albarn/Blur, Day 3

Tonight the third installment of our Damon Albarn series comes to us courtesy of the Gorillaz. Laika Comes Home is a remix album of the first Gorillaz album and for this reason it not strictly a Gorillaz release but billed as Gorillaz vs. Spacemonkeyz. I assume the Spacemonkeyz took part in the remixing, or at least were paid a royalty for any troubles their matchup caused them. The album was released in 2002 on Astralwerks Records.

While I never got into this highly successful (Did any of you see the opening of the last Grammy’s when they performed w/ Madonna?) side project, I really like Laika Comes Home because the remixes are deeply rooted in dub reggae which is a favorite of mine.

For the unaware's Gorillaz is an audio/visual project comprised of Albarn, Miho Hatori (of Cibo Matto), Tina Weymouth & Chris Frantz (of Talking Heads, Tom Tom Club), Dan “The Automator” and others (Dennis Hopper, Shaun Ryder, Debbie Harry, Kid Koala, Del The Funky Homosapien-some of these are names I never thought I would type and never hope to again). The visual aspect of the partnership consists of visual cartoonish images created by Jamie Hewlett. I imagine that his visuals are much more entertaining than watching the above musicians, with the exceptions of Ms. Weymouth and Dennis Hopper, but only because he is fucking nuts.

Gorillaz vs. Spacemonkeyz - 19/2000 (Jungle Fresh)
Gorillaz vs. Spacemonkeyz - Punk (De-Punked)

Tomorrow's feature will be The Good, The Bad & The Queen. 'Till then have a nice day.

P.S. Rumor's floating that Tom Waits will be at the 'Roo this summer.

P.P.S. Support your local record shops before their are none and you bitch about it.

Damon Albarn/Blur, Day 2

In 2002, Damon Albarn released Mali Music (Honest Jons Records), an album he recorded with Malian musicians while visting the country. The album is billed as a release by Albarn, Afel Bocoum, Tolimani Diabate and Friends. The music is dynamic, awakening and a real interesting blend of western and world music. Besides the tracking of multiple artists their are lots of sounds on Mali Music, derived from a variety of intstruments. Albarn, no stranger to Augustus Pablo and his brand of dub reggae, brought along a melodica, a child like instrument capable of churning out some attractive sounds. There are also things called kalimbas, koras, monochords and a trez. But don't get worried because drums, guitars, bass and xylophone's also appear as well as vocals, lots of cool sounds emitting out from these humans.

The pictures (their are a bunch) accompanying the disc, show Albarn in as many different settings as their are pages. He is frequently playing his melodica joined by those he recorded with. I'm not sure if Albarn would classify the music made on his trip as field recordings but they certainly do come off as recorded "live." Apparently, the album was recorded at various venues, clubs and bars where Albarn could set up shop. Though Albarn later, in a studio, added instruments and other sounds.

Before moving on to the music, I want to point out that this album is surely not a descendant of Paul Simon's Graceland (not that that would be a bad thing). Albarn stays pretty faithful to the Malian/World sound, not really incorporating it into pop music. Rather he performed a reverse operation, incorporating elements of pop music into what by and large is world-ish composition, perhaps not strictly Malian but borrowing from Jamaica and other distant locales.

Finally, this post would not have been made without the recommendation of this album right after it came out, by my friend NB who had so graciously opened his Mass. home up to me for the night. Before a game of pool he put this on and I do believe without wasting any time I told him to turn it off. "Who would play pool to this?" I thought. Well, he is a better man than me because we would all be better pool players if we listened to some Mali Music while playing a little 8 ball.

Mali Music - Spoons
Mali Music - The Djembe
Mali Music - Niber

Buy Mali Music at Amazon.

Just in case you needed a brit-pop fix:
Cast - Fine Time

Damon Albarn/Blur, Day 1

This week marks the release of Damon Albarn's new project The Good, The Bad and The Queen. The album is to feature Paul Simonon of the Clash, Afrobeat drummer Tony Allen, Simon Tong of The Verve and was produced by Dangermouse. I've seen mixed reviews from the album but am pretty excited to hear it in full myself.

I thought it would be interesting to spend the next few days putting a spotlight on Damon Albarn's career with Blur and on into his side/solo projects. Blur were arguably, next to Oasis, the best of the Britpop scene. There music was clearly British but it also was highly original and fun to listen to. The band released seven albums. Modern Life is Rubbish (1993) and Parklife (1994) are hailed as their most spectacular but even Think Tank (2003), their last LP and only without guitarist Graham Coxon is worth checking out.

My plan is to begin with some Blur and move on to Mali Music (2002), an album Albarn wrote and recorded in Mali with local musicians and some interesting musicians. Next, I'd like to toss up a little Gorillaz but something from the remix album, Laika Come Home. From there I think I may be ready to post a track from The Good, The Bad & The Queen and close up the week by returning to Blur (how cool would it be if Albarn himself did that as well?).

So to get things rolling I wanted to set up the juxtaposition in Albarn's musical tastes and capabilities that he displayed within Blur and outside that group. From Blur's The Great Escape (1995) we have Country House. From Think Tank is Moroccan People's Revolutionary Bowls Club, complete with robotic ending.

I hope you enjoy