Who's behind the Gorillaz?

While I've alwasy known that the Gorillaz are an animated band, i.e. DJ alter-egos or at least so I haved assumed. I guess I never really probed to much because I liked the music enough that I didn't care as long as they kept making the music. Well, the question has been borrowing away inside my head until recently. I decided to do a little internet research into the mild mannered identities of these animated musical super-heros. What follows are the results of that casual query. The interview with Albarn has actually disuaded me from being too interested in the music of Blur, even though I obviously like Albarn's stuff. We'll see.

"In the sky of popular music a new star has risen, the hip-hop-punk-dub band Gorillaz. This multichannel phenomenon appears on TV, radio, the Internet, movies and videogames. But there's something peculiar going on with this band. The members are virtual personae, going by the names Murdoc, 2D, Noodles and Russell. The creators of this animated, virtual band (Damon Albarn, the singer for Brit-pop band Blur, and Jamie Hewlett, creator of the cult comic Tank Girl) insist that the group is its own entity. "We're just their mentors," declares Nakamura, the band's producer. "The Gorillaz have their own personalities and idiosyncrasies. We're just there to make sure everything comes out okay, and Jamie's art gives a fuller picture of who they are.". (McCort, 2001)

The band's official web site, www.gorillaz.com, is maintained by Hewlett's London based studio Zombie and provides insight into the band members' histories and mental states. Visitors can view the videos in a virtual theatre and poke through bedrooms, cars, computers, jukeboxes. (McCort, 2001).

Hewlett and Albarn have recruited several other animators and musicians to help flesh out the band. Dan "the Automator" Nakamura, rapper Del the Funkee Homosapien of Deltron 3030, Miho Hatori of Cibo Matto, former Talking Head bassist Tina Weymouth and Buena Vista 9 Social Club's Ibrahim Ferrer are among those who have contributed their talents to the project. (McCort, 2001; D'Angelo, 2001; Gorillaz: In the Cage, 2001)"

RollingStone.com: Gorillaz : Albarn Going Ape Over Gorillaz : News
other musical pseudonymns

[Gorillaz] [Blur] [TankGirl] [Albarn] [Hewlett] [imaginary] [band] [animated] [music] [Pseudonym] [identity]