Whenever a new album from a band I like comes out, I always make a quick little review, where I rate each song on a scale of 1-10 and then determine the mean, median, and mode rating from that set of ratings. I've posted them in the past on social media, but I thought it would be nice to make it an official blog post instead, where I dive further into my thoughts on a record. Depending on how this goes I might continue to do it in the future, I may even do it live or make videos instead. But in the meanwhile the blog format works.
Gorillaz is a band I like alright. I'm not a huge fan of them by any means, but they're neat. I like the experimental nature of the band. Recently they released a new album called "The Mountain." As of writing this paragraph I have yet to listen to it, but it interests me that it has so many tracks, is over an hour in length, and was created independent of Parlophone, a first for the band. I heard iffy things about their previous release, Cracker Island, so I am curious to see what I will think of this. I haven't heard any singles or anything, so I'll be going in completely blind. Without further ado...
Review
Now I have listened to the album three times. My opinions of each track are as follows:
The opening track, The Mountain, is a pleasant intro. It starts off mostly ambient, but then the melody kicks in and it gains a lot more character. I'm not a fan of ambient tracks, so I like that it changes. The callback to Demon Days is very interesting, apparently the vocals used were unused takes from recording Fire Coming Out Of The Monkey's Head. I wonder why Gorillaz decided to do that? Maybe The Mountain is conceptually related to Demon Days? In any case, this is a nice intro track.
The next track, The Moon Cave, is a favorite of mine off this album. 2D does a good job leading it, and his performance is good. The strings are a favorite element of mine, along with the main synth line. Both of them come together to make a familiar sounding, electronic dance beat. But the real interesting part is when the Indian instruments come in (if I knew what they were called I would call them that. I think they're Indian). Though in my opinion, the highlight of this track is the main feature, Black Thought. Not a lot of raps are in triple meter, but he does a great job at making it seem normal. Overall, a great first proper track.
Following is The Happy Dictator. I feel like this track is just alright. I don't really like the "oh what a happy land we live in" parts, I think the song would've been better without them, and if the vocal melodies in the verses were different overall. Other than that it's a good song, it just kind of makes it harder for me to enjoy. The song feels topical to what's going on in the United States, though apparently it was based off of a real dictator of the past. The chorus and the lead into it are probably my favorite parts, and the verses after the first chorus are better than the first ones in my opinion. I like the overdubs on 2D's vocals there. The feature is nice, I think they're doing the bridge, which is cool. Overall, I'd say I like this song, but it's not amazing.
I feel like it's hard to review The Hardest Thing, because it's a perfectly fine into into Orange County, but once again I'm not really a fan of ambient music. I need lots of stuff going on, y'know? The easiest way to rate this song is that I'd say it's a skip, but that's not a reflection on the objective quality of the song, just how much I personally like it.
Orange County is really nice. The whistle and the beat as a whole are nice to just vibe to, it sounds like happiness, which contrast with the down lyrics. Once again the lyrics of this song feel topical to what's happening in the US, but that's probably just indicative of how bad things are here, especially since Gorillaz is based in the UK. The feature, Kara Jackson, is also really good. I love the back and forth her and 2D have. I found this song stuck in my head the other day, whistling to it for a while. I don't consider this a masterpiece of a song, unlike a couple others songs on this record, but it is catchy and pleasant, and is that such a bad quality for a song to have? I think not.
The God of Lying is just alright. It's got a really interesting thing going for it, once again reminding me of the state of the US. I think this is one track where I don't love the feature, though I wouldn't say 2D's performance is much better. The instrumental is the most interesting part of this song, not necessarily amazing, but interesting. Especially during the chorus there's a lot of interesting synth stuff going on in the right and left channels separately. Overall I'd call this track "interesting." Not bad, just very experimental and not my thing.
The Empty Dream Machine is the first track that I really don't care for. For the first while it doesn't seem like it has a lot going for it, just a slow tune, kind of reminiscent of some older Gorillaz stuff. Though the Indian instruments definitely make it unique. The rap part is better, but not as good as the other rap features on this album. I like the Alice in Wonderland reference though! There's also the part at the end where the other features are singing, which is probably the highlight of the song, but it's at the very end and I don't really feel like waiting through the rest of the song to get there, so this is probably another skip. Not bad, but just really not my thing. I feel like that's how I feel about a lot of this album.
Now, The Manifesto, is a terrific track. This is an easy favorite of mine from this record. I have no idea what Trueno is saying, but I wish I did because his performance is so good. He kills it on this beat, which is also killer. I love the emphasis on the downbeat, kind of calls to mind a march, but I'm sure there's a specific genre of music it's emulating. I love the global influence music can have, as we have a Argentine rapper, where rap is a historically black genre originating in the US. All the while the music is created by a British virtual band, with Indian inspirations, and I'm listening to it in the US. Crazy. The hook is great, very catchy. This is one of the few songs where I really love what 2D is doing. The Proof feature is a really nice complement to what the rest of the song does, I love the beat switch too. Some of my favorite lyrics are the "got you beefin' with yo block" lines and what comes afterwards. Rest in peace Big Proof. And just when you think it's done, Trueno comes back and finishes his feature. Ain't much to say about the outro, 2D is still killing it here. The "only automatic now" part is very nice and vibey. Again, this is by far my favorite track.
Following such a terrific track is the Plastic Guru. I get it, that's an act I would hate to follow too. It's not terrific, but it's better than Empty Dream Machine imo, but only by a small amount. I don't really have much to say about this song, it's just okay. Leaves a lot to be desired I think.
Okay, back to a terrific track, we have Delirium. Once again I think 2D's parts leave something to be desired, but they're not bad by any means. The real highlight of this track though is the Mark E. Smith feature, because it's terrific. And not just the vocals, but the beat and everything going on there. Definitely calls to mind Glitter Freeze from Plastic Beach. Though the lyrics are kinda bizarre, and I really wonder what they're about. But then again the song is called "Delirium", so maybe they're not supposed to make any sense. One of my favorites from this album, other than that I don't much else to say.
Next up we have Damascus. This track isn't bad, it's quite nice, but I don't like it nearly as much as the other tracks with similar things going on. Though I do really like the back and forth between Yasiin Bey and Omar Souleyman. Just like The Manifesto, I don't know what Omar is saying, but his performance is really good, so I wish I knew. The global influences of this album are really nice, as this is a type of music I usually wouldn't listen to. The hook is also nice, and the fresh at the end is kind of funny. Apparently the vocals were unused from Plastic Beach, no wonder this album reminds me of Plastic Beach so much. That's all I have to say about this song, it's really good, but not up there with The Manifesto.
I think I like The Shadowy Light better than some of the other tracks just because it's got a pleasant thing going for it, but once again I don't find it nearly as interesting as many of the other tracks that are faster and just have more going on. This is one of the few songs where I prefer 2D's parts over the rest of it. There's another feature in another language, but this time it's a lot slower, so I have less interest in it. The shadowy light starts a run to the rest of the album where the tracks are all slow, which really affects my opinion of the album. Anyways, this one is just alright, not bad.
Casablanca isn't very interesting imo. Though I'm biased because, as mentioned, I like the faster songs with more going on. I'm sure it's a great track if you like that slow sort of thing, but I just don't. The instrumental also leaves a lot to be desired I think. Overall, I'd say it's my least favorite on this album, almost bordering to actively disliking it. Definitely a skip.
Almost at the end we have The Sweet Prince. Still not quite my cup of tea, but I like it a lot more than some of the other slow tracks. It's a pleasant listen. I like the guitar part a lot, and the outro is cool, reminds me of beat in The Manifesto. I'd say this is a good song. It may be slow, but every album needs a slow track, especially right before the last track.
Finally, we have The Sad God. It's a bit on the slow side, but I like it a lot better than the three songs before it. It reminds me a lot of Pirate Jet from Plastic Beach. I actually quite like this song, it feels like a reprise of The Mountain title track, which I already liked, but it fleshes out the elements and puts a nice beat behind them. The rap seems kind of out of place, but it is good. There's a lot of Black Thought features, which reminds of all the Del the Funky Homosapien features on the first Gorillaz album, I wonder if it's maybe supposed to represent Russell? I'm sure there's an answer, but I don't quite follow the Gorillaz lore, which there is a lot of, so I don't know.
Overall I'd call this album really hit and miss. Because there are some parts that I LOVE, while there are other parts that are just boring to me. 2D does an alright job, but I think the features tend to outperform him on this record. His performance is good, but the melodies usually leave something to be desired. There's also the few slow tracks, which aren't bad, but I just don't personally like them. This album reminds me of Plastic Beach a surprising amount, but to be fair I haven't listened to anything newer by Gorillaz, so it's possible there are other Gorillaz albums that this sounds like.
Doing some more research into the album, apparently a lot of the features are posthumous, which plays interestingly into the album's themes of death. It must feel weird to work with audio of deceased collaborators, which I'm sure reinforced a lot of the album's writing. However, the theme of death is usually a somber one, whereas this album takes the happier route, which I think is refreshing. Death is a scary thing, but we are alive right now, and we should make the most of it by being happy as much as we can be.
Now that I have reviewed every track, following is the numerical score of the album:
Rating
- The Mountain - (7/10)
- The Moon Cave - (9/10)
- The Happy Dictator - (7/10)
- The Hardest Thing - (6/10)
- Orange County - (8/10)
- The God of Lying - (7/10)
- The Empty Dream Machine - (6/10)
- The Manifesto - (10/10)
- The Plastic Guru - (6/10)
- Delirium - (9/10)
- Damascus - (8/10)
- The Shadowy Light - (6/10)
- Casablanca - (5/10)
- The Sweet Prince - (6/10)
- The Sad God - (8/10)
Mean - (7.2/10) - Taking into account the good and bad tracks, the average score is just above good.
Median - (7/10) - Despite most of the tracks just being okay, there are a lot of good ones, and that pushes the median to being good.
Mode - (6/10) - But most tracks are just okay. Not bad, but I'm probably not gonna go out of my way to listen to them on their own, which brings down the album's score as a whole.
Conclusion
This album was definitely worth the listen. It's available on streaming platforms everywhere, as well as Bandcamp, and on physical media such as CDs. You should listen to it! Jamie Hewlett has said that he wanted to create an album that was an intentional experience to listen to fully, and not just something you casually pick parts out of to have on in the background. To quote the Wikipedia article:
Hewlett said people listening to the album are "supposed to listen to it from beginning to end", saying that they were "trying to bring back that idea of taking time to invest in something, instead of this culture of scrolling"
A lot of the collaborators also seem moved to have appeared on this album, and provide insightful quotes as to how much it means to them. To quote Wikipedia again:
"In one part of 'The Shadowy Light', I [Asha Bhosle] sing, 'Chal mere raahi, gehra hain paani, mujhe jaana hain uss paar.' I'm telling the boatman to ferry me across the river, which is my life's journey: my birth, my relationships, my dedication to music, my achievements, my duties as a mother, daughter, sister, wife and Indian. The boatman is a metaphor for my music, which has guided me across this river of life. When I get to the other side, my journey will be complete and I will attain moksha. If you listen carefully, you will be able to discern thousands of sounds floating around us. I shall become one of them. This freedom to become one with nature is what awaits me on the other side of the river."
Music is a powerful thing, and it requires a lot of work to make it that way. The themes of this album were inspired by Damon and Jamie's experiences in life, the grief they had been through, the places they had traveled, and the people they had met. Music has a way of being able to take complex human experiences and transforming it into art. And this album is Gorillaz's latest piece of art.
I'll stick with my rating, but I do recommend listening to it, the way that its creators intended it to be listened to.
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