The Mountain, the ninth album from Damon Albarn and Jamie Hewlett’s digital band Gorillaz, represents maybe the best distillation but of the sound that Albarn and Hewlett have lengthy been trying to find all through your complete historical past of Gorillaz as an idea. That distillation results in one of the eclectic, entertaining, and energetic albums within the group’s 25-year historical past.
The place early albums from the group regarded to supply a kaleidoscopic imaginative and prescient of hip-hop and pop music by way of cartoon characters and an infinite visitor musician listing, The Mountain fascinatingly melds parts from numerous music cultures from around the globe with the usual Gorillaz sound—fats beats, idiosyncratic instrumental textures, and one-of-a-kind melodies courtesy of mastermind Damon Albarn—right into a stunningly unique doc, and a ringing success for the outfit.
On The Mountain: Background and Themes
The Mountain feels completely different from plenty of Gorillaz albums in that it really performs like a full assertion (or an idea album) as a substitute of only a assortment of memorable songs with notable collaborators. Damon Albarn had been speaking for years about this being a daring new course for the mission, and you may hear that within the completed album. Journey, loss, and a profound sense of religious curiosity all form this file in a method that feels significant this far into the group’s profession.
Hewlett additionally claimed in a Rolling Stone interview that listeners are “presupposed to take heed to it from starting to finish,” saying they had been “attempting to convey again that concept of taking time to put money into one thing, as a substitute of this tradition of scrolling,” and that provides up. The Mountain isn’t a type of Gorillaz albums that feels finest once you cherry-pick a number of songs. It feels designed to unfold as an entire piece.
Numerous that course got here from their time spent in India, which clearly left its mark on the album’s sound and environment. The title itself was partly impressed by Albarn and Jamie Hewlett’s go to to Amber Fort in Jaipur, whereas the picture of the mountain additionally related again to an earlier journey in western China.
That issues as a result of The Mountain doesn’t sound like Gorillaz randomly pulling influences from in all places simply because they will. It feels like an album constructed from locations, experiences, and concepts that really meant one thing to the folks making it – Albarn foremost but in addition his collaborators and myriad co-writers and visitor musicians.
Greater than something, although, that is an album formed by grief. Albarn and Hewlett each skilled the deaths of shut relations earlier than and through its creation, and that sense of loss hangs over the file from begin to end. The outstanding factor is that it by no means turns the album right into a gloom-laden slog. The Mountain is clearly curious about demise, reminiscence, and what would possibly come after, nevertheless it nonetheless feels full of life, unusual, and stuffed with movement. That pressure is an enormous a part of what makes the album work so properly.
It additionally helps clarify one of many album’s most putting decisions. Albarn used unused or alternate vocal takes from a number of late collaborators, together with soul legend Bobby Womack, rapper David Jolicoeur (aka Trugoy the Dove of De La Soul), actor Dennis Hopper, rapper Proof of D12, post-punk legend Mark E. Smith of The Fall, and drummer Tony Allen. On paper, the additions of departed legends as featured artists on this album might come throughout as somewhat gimmicky and even low cost.
Nevertheless, the dealing with of their contributions is respectful and significant, as if the songs couldn’t actually exist to their fullest potential with out the voices or devices that the departed contributors supplied. The influence of these additions offers your complete mission additional weight, and actually makes the album a potent and highly effective rumination on the circle of life.
Track Highlights
These tracks finest seize The Mountain’s sweeping ambition, emotional weight, and memorable stylistic vary.
“The Manifesto”
Whereas this monitor would possibly instantly sound like a jumbled mishmash of kinds and sounds, it really works extraordinarily properly inside the stream of the album, and its placement as monitor eight on a 15-song album means it roughly represents the album’s centerpiece. With a dynamite verse from the late rapper Proof sandwiched between verses sung in Spanish by Latin hip-hop artist Trueno, this track represents the mission assertion of The Mountain.
“The Joyful Dictator”
This jaunty synth-pop ditty belies its unhappy messaging: “Should you’re empty and abstracted and your damaged coronary heart is filled with rage,” and it represents a soothing salve to the darkish, turbulent actuality that’s life in 2026.
“Damascus”
An unbelievable monitor that sounds as if it was beamed from 40 years sooner or later to at the moment with motoric hip-hop interludes courtesy of Yasiin Bey (previously often called Mos Def) subsequent to intricate Arabic verses from Syrian singer Omar Souleyman. Extremely danceable.
“The Empty Dream Machine”
A fragile but booming sound underscores among the best melodies on your complete album on this expansive monitor, which boasts the guitar skills of The Smiths’ melodic guitar grasp Johnny Marr in addition to swooping sitar thrives courtesy of Anoushka Shankar, the daughter of sitar legend Ravi Shankar. Regardless of boasting a hypnotic drone-like backing, this track’s practically six-minute runtime merely zooms by.
“The Plastic Guru”
Among the many shortest tracks on the album, this catchy and exquisite work showcases the eminently melodic guitar skills of Johnny Marr as soon as once more, as his lovely, forceful arpeggios underscore an extremely memorable melody.
“The Candy Prince”
Arguably essentially the most lovely track on the album, it additionally sounds essentially the most like a “traditional” Gorillaz track (a la Plastic Seaside’s “On Melancholy Hill,” as an example), in that it options no uncommon style excursions and easily sees Damon Albarn singing defeatedly in opposition to a twinkling synth-pop and sitar backdrop with fluttering flute thrives from Indian classical flautist Ajay Prasanna. A wistful, beautiful masterpiece.
“The Unhappy God”
A becoming approach to finish the album, this monitor boasts a Nineteen Fifties doo-wop-style melody, which additionally occurs to be among the many sweetest on your complete album. Ruminative and nice, this track feels as in case you’re drifting into oblivion, surrounded by your closest family and friends—able to see what comes subsequent.
A Worthy Climb
In a storied profession based mostly on what was seemingly first created as one thing of a novelty, Gorillaz have continued to supply unbelievable work properly into their third decade of existence.
Whereas there have been ups and downs within the group’s discography, The Mountain is the primary album from the group with no affiliation to the file firm Parlophone (The Beatles’ and Radiohead’s unique file label), as Albarn and Hewlett launched it by way of their very own label, Kong.
Maybe that inventive freedom gave them the arrogance required to incorporate voices of late collaborators, in addition to songs sung in a number of languages together with English, Arabic, Hindi, Spanish, and Yoruba.
The Mountain is a towering achievement, and one that may certainly age properly over the course of the remainder of Gorillaz’s (hopefully) prolonged recording profession.
Header Photograph Courtesy Drew de F Fawkes/Wikimedia Commons
