Marc SauvageMusic correspondent
Luc Dyson
Damon Albarn has forgotten himself.
It’s Friday night at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium, and he’s in the middle of rehearsals for Gorillaz’s first-ever stadium show – a multicultural, multimedia pop extravaganza, with more guests than a double-booked Airbnb.
As the band launches into Dirty Harry, the long, courtside LED screens light up with a cartoon choir singing the song’s refrain, “all I do is dance.”
Seemingly surprised, Albarn jumps from the stage to watch, with a wide, toothy smile spreading across his face. Then he sees Argentinian rapper Trueno crossing the stadium and rushes to give him a hug.
The band continues to play without their frontman – and it takes almost 10 minutes for Albarn to realize that he might be needed on stage.
“I’m the worst leader,” he admitted to me an hour earlier.
“I’m horrible. I have a very relaxed approach to showmanship.”
Blair Brown
Quite the contrary: Albarn’s relaxed atmosphere sets the tone for everyone around you.
Behind the scenes at Tottenham there are more than 30 musicians from 15 different countries, and not an ounce of ego between them.
“The atmosphere is ridiculous,” says South African singer Moonchild Sanelly. “Damon is open, he’s cool, he has humility.
“Everyone whose art he admires, he takes with him. Even when he’s zen, I’ll sit next to him, just so we can breathe each other’s air.”
“It’s an eclectic family, that’s for sure,” says Kara Jackson, a folk singer and poet who is a regular guest at recent Gorillaz shows.
“It’s kind of like I’m from the South, where I’m from, in the United States. You have cousins, but they’re not really your blood cousins - you just call your mother’s best friend your aunt for all these years.”
“An atypical group”
Behind the scenes, it’s like a UN of music. Malian singer Fatoumata Diawara chats in traditional Wassoulou attire, while Johnny Marr strolls around in an equally traditional Mancunian parka.
American alt-pop heroes Sparks arrive in a black BMW just after 5:00 p.m. BST and open the trunk to collect their stage costumes (Russell has a pink polka dot suit, Ron is in funeral attire).
Twenty minutes later, they’re on stage rehearsing The Happy Dictator; followed by Shaun Ryder, playing his role in the 2005 classic Dare!
“We’re an unusual group, aren’t we?” Marr said.
“I don’t think there’s anything like that. Not in my experience, anyway.”
Blair Brown
Blair Brown
Blair Brown
In the canteen, Syrian and African musicians enjoy the Posdnuos of De La Soul and sitar legend Anoushka Shankar. On the menu, honey-glazed lime chicken, roast sea bass, caramelized leek penne and outrageously delicious passion fruit meringue.
“The food here is great, man,” says British rapper Bashy.
“When we toured with Gorillaz for the first time (in 2010), I gained so much weight that when I got home I had to go to the gym and get back in shape.”
One person who won’t need a post-show workout is Jamie Hewlett – who dreamed up the idea of Gorillaz as a “virtual band” with Albarn in 1998.
He tours the stadium with a film crew to shoot a documentary commemorating this unique event.
Ambitious, the end result will show human musicians mingling with their cartoon counterparts (2-D, Murdoc, Noodle and Russell), meaning every shot must be meticulously planned.
“The goal is to reveal what it takes to put on such a show,” he says.
“We have artists filming themselves getting on planes from different parts of the world, then everyone gathering here in Tottenham, the fans arriving, the Gorillaz show and the aftermath, when there are just empty beer cups left.”
Blair Brown
Blair Brown
His enthusiasm is mixed with surprise. Gorillaz wasn’t supposed to last 28 years.
“We were going to make an album for fun,” he says. “We didn’t know this was going to continue.
“I think it lasted because of the collaborations, and also because of the cartoons.
“You attract new generations because they like cartoons, and then your nine-year-old discovers Bobby Womack or Mark E Smith and all the great people we work with.”
But there is a more serious side to the project, which has always mixed pop sensations and cross-cultural understanding.
“The message is more urgent than ever,” Hewlett says.
“I’m surprised that’s the case, because I thought all the (prejudice) was gone, but it seems to be coming back. I find it disgusting and hateful, and I can’t stand it.”
“The idea of saying that your culture is somehow superior to another culture, or that it can’t be compatible, is ridiculous,” Albarn agrees.
“Everything is inextricably and obviously linked.
“We all need to understand each other and not fall into the trap of overly simplistic arguments put forward by people who don’t necessarily believe what they say, but see a political advantage in it.”
De La Soul star Kevin “Posdnuos” Mercer, who has been recording with Gorillaz since 2005, says exploring the world with Albarn (and his own bandmates) has taught him valuable lessons.
“I was lucky enough to grow up well and have a pretty open mind, but when you really start to travel and take the time to be in other people’s worlds, you’ll find that you have preconceived ideas that don’t fit into your life. [reflect reality]”, he said.
“Regardless of where that person comes from or what their religion is, we all have truly common moments to share.
“It allows you to cherish what is similar and not always see the differences with each other.”
Luc Dyson
Gorillaz’s latest album, The Mountain, illustrates this approach. It relies largely on Hindu concept of Samsara – the continuing cycle of birth, life, death and reincarnation – to help Albarn and Hewlett deal with the deaths of their own parents.
Across 15 tracks, it mixes Indian musicians with archival recordings of the band’s deceased collaborators – from actor Dennis Hopper to rapper D12 Proof – creating a bridge between the living and the dead.
“I was in a world of grief and confusion, and it was just nice to have all these people with me,” Albarn says.
“They helped me, in a way, to deal with my own grief and come out of it positive, which is what any of us can really hope for.”
Mercer can understand. He was going through a similar process on De La Soul’s 2025 album Cabin In The Sky – working with outtakes and unfinished ideas from his bandmate Dave Jolicoeur, who died in 2023.
In Tottenham, he performed alongside his old friend’s videos on a version of Feel Good Inc which rumbled like a juggernaut.
Keeping that connection alive “has been so meaningful,” the musician says.
“You will find yourself crying, with tears in your eyes – but the love for him is still there, and his spirit is still there.”
Luc Dyson
Luc Dyson
Phoebe Fox
This isn’t the only moment the show offers an opportunity to reflect.
Indian singer Asha Bhosle – once immortalized in Cornershop’s Brimful of Asha – also appears on video screens, singing The Shadowy Light.
It was the last song she recorded before her death in April, and it features the star asking the boatman to carry her across the river to the afterlife.
On stage, Asha’s granddaughter, Zanai, sings backing vocals, in a symbolic passing of the torch.
“I think she would love this moment,” Zanai told the group after rehearsal.
‘I feel your love’
Twenty-four later, 70,000 fans held up their phones and lit up the stadium to the sound of Asha Bohsle’s voice.
Moved by the spectacle, Albarn asks the group to repeat the final chorus of the song, murmuring the words like an incantation.
It’s a moment of remarkable calm in a concert that is largely a colorful, career-spanning celebration.
19/2000 has cool shoeshine, Rhinestone Eyes is suitably electric-tric-tric, and Clint Eastwood puts the sun right in the bag.
The audience rarely stops moving. And yes, there are thousands of beaming faces for the Dirty Harry cartoon choir.
Albarn sometimes recalls his moves on stage during the Blur days, rushing into the crowd and declaring, “I feel your love.”
But he’s just as comfortable ceding the spotlight to Little Simz or laughing while trading riffs with flutist Ajay Prasanna.
As one critic said, he is not so much a bandleader as “the conductor of an orchestra re of an entire musical ecosystem”.
“I like it because that’s how I like to see myself,” he says.
“I can play the role of leader, but I like being part of a community.”
Moonchild Sanelly says it in a more colorful way.
“Damon is a crazy guru,” she laughs. “He’s crazy.”
List of Gorillaz songs
- The Mountain
- The happy dictator
- Trans
- Tomorrow comes today
- 19/2000
- Rhinestone eyes
- Saturnz Barz
- The Moon Cave
- Tomorrow
- Empire Ants
- With love for an ex
- The empty dream machine
- Casablanca
- Delirium
- Andromeda
- Sorry
- Pen
- Damascus
- Dirty Harry
- Garage Palace
- White flag
- The dark light
- The sad God
- Cloud of Unknowing
- Plastic beach
- On the melancholy hill
- Orange County
- The Manifesto
- To dare!
- Feel Good Inc.
- Clint Eastwood
Luc Dyson
