Damon Albarn Quotes
-
I'm a working musician, so it's what I do. I kind of always have lots of plates spinning, and it's the ones that keep spinning the longest that I end up doing.
-
I'm English, and I started off as a songwriter, so I can't really escape that - it's there.
-
The Gorillaz cartoons seem more real to me than the actual people on TV. Because at least you know that there's some intelligence behind the cartoons, and there's a lot of work that's gone into it, so it can't all be just a lie.
-
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.
-
I'm not really one of those people who believes that if you're a musician you can just leave that behind and start getting into politics.
-
When you're doing a deal with someone in the southern Sahara, it's a very different way of doing business than in London. You can't sign them in the usual way because they'd end up getting ripped off, which would defeat the object of setting up a label like this.
-
If you don't see something as a career but as an important part of your life, you don't know how you're going to feel about it.
-
I think pop music is a great place to get new ideas across.
-
I used to go to work and take heroin in the studio and then stop when I came home.
-
I like to go to Africa purely with something to do. I'm not very comfortable getting into an armor-plated Land Rover and going to see things, with my hand gel, you know, it's not me at all. So I like to hang out and you know, really get to know people and try and do something that resonates with them.
-
More and more, cultural groups are cross-pollinating, and we're getting much more interesting art as a result.
-
As a musician usually music is your way out.
-
I was approached by Oxfam to go to Mali as their ambassador and get involved in their various initiatives out there. But I felt that was missing the point of using me, a musician.
-
Whether people like it or not, China is incredibly important to the future of mankind. For me, this is something that we all need to have intelligent discussions about in America, in Britain, in Europe.
-
I'm not a monarchist. But I'm English. And I have an irrational emotion for my country.
-
As soon as it sounds fine, I'm on to the next thing, man.
-
I don't need to be a frontman all the time, and in fact, the older I get, the less of an urge it is inside me to play that role. I've still got it inside me, and I do occasionally allow it out.
-
It always struck me that Africa was, in a strange way, a futuristic place and had elements and vibes and spirits that were going to inform the future. Africa Express is an attempt to engage that power outside Africa, and for everyone to benefit from it.
-
The things that make me happy most are my family and working.
-
China is one of those vast, continental conglomerates that... I mean, if they were to start a tourist trade in China, they'd just bus people in from another province, you know what I mean? They're very self-contained.
-
You know, there are many alter egos and Gorillaz is a collective of alter egos, really. I think anyone who gets involved in it has to sort of accept that nothing is really as it seems.
-
It's not like my old self – I'm not in character anymore, I'm me. I'm not hiding behind that anymore.
-
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?
-
Whenever you're writing something that's reflective, you have to put yourself through some sort of ordeal just to understand the way you're feeling.