It’s on! Song machine baby!

Gorillaz surprised everyone when they got back together in 2017 for their next album, Humanz. Although they’ve now been back for a while and have made two decent records since, the band was seeming a bit lost. Damon Albarn and Jamie Hewlett had yet to catch up the fictional band members 2-D (Albarn’s fictional vocalist), Russel, Noodle, and Murdoc to a musical landscape vastly different from when they left it. Turns out focusing on singles and collaborations (a vital tenant of the band’s philosophy), has returned them to not the sound but the power of their Plastic Beach (2010) days, with a clarity and characteristic brand of darkness that has been absent for a decade.

At the beginning of 2020, Gorillaz announced a new project entitled Song Machine, each month releasing a single with one or more special guests and a corresponding video. At first it seemed like a year-long single parade, but after releasing “Episode 6: Strange Timez,” the world’s favorite virtual band announced “Song Machine Season 1,” containing the tracks already released along with ten new songs—another album’s worth! 

First we must discuss the singles, or in this case “episodes.” Song Machine left me begging for more after every release, a silver lining in 2020; every month I had a new collaboration to look forward to. Whether it was the hot thoughts of rapper Slowthai backed by the garage guitars of Slaves on “Momentary Bliss,” or the grandiose final act of Afrobeat pioneer Tony Allen on “How Far?,” there was never a dull moment. As a dedicated new wave fan, I was happily surprised to find Peter Hook, bassist for Joy Division and New Order, and Robert Smith of The Cure among the guests. The singles also show how this new project cycle affects Gorillaz’s process. “Pac-Man” hits harder as Schoolboy Q drops bars about his own experiences as a Black man in America. This song came in July, hitting the right points at the right time. Some of the points made on the album are not so precise, but they don’t always need to be. Many artists are criticized for being “vaguely political,” but music doesn’t exist in a vacuum. When Schoolboy Q raps about only being what 2-D calls a “mad Pac-Man” living in a big game, or Robert Smith simply contemplates the oddness of the era, you will have to have an understanding of what a pivotal moment 2020 was. Asking an audience to learn doesn’t make music outdated; it’s a challenge to connect what was to what is. Even if the enemy changes, the struggle can be relatable. Music can be documentation, and the Song Machine is recording history through the eyes of an incredibly diverse group of artists, to anchor us in the cacophony.

On Humanz the band adopted a clubby vibe that pervaded the record, and though some of the songs felt right, the guests often felt misplaced, as if at the wrong party. At times the production foiled the guest, especially notable on “Momentz,” a great track save the overbearing percussion that gives the whole song an awkward structure for De La Soul to fight through like a crowded dance floor. 

There is no such moment on Song Machine, which is an impressive feat considering this is the biggest guest list ever boasted by Gorillaz: at least one guest per track, with seventeen tracks. The focus on singles allows each collaboration its own space; these are like separate Zoom calls with intimate friends, not an unruly party where no one knows each other. Though the tracks are all powerful alone, this doesn’t feel like a playlist. These are strange times, and among the many ideas the tracklist is well thought-out and functions cohesively. The album is formatted like a greenhouse, in which very different plants are tended with utmost care, grown together under one roof. Some musical ideas are employed as motifs for continuity, such as the twinkling piano from Elton John on “The Pink Phantom” that escapes his guest feature to fit in throughout other tracks. The brass that supports Malian songstress Fatoumata Diawara on “Désolé” erupt once more in the nighttime ruminations on the Moonchild Sanelly collaboration “With Love to An Ex.” Much fun will be had relistening and figuring out how all the disparate elements present fit together.

Well-incorporated guests play off Damon Albarn’s virtual alter ego 2-D very well, hitting the balance to give what we know to be Gorillaz magic: collaboration as fusion. The times when Gorillaz does lean into a guest’s specialty are so rewarding; “Aries” is essentially Gorillaz channeling New Order, which exempts it from all criticism. A pristine new Peter Hook bass line is too good for this world, and the song is perfectly contoured to fit around one of the greatest tones in popular music. Robert Smith’s voice is still so singular four decades into his career, and “Strange Timez” showcases his powerful chorus, the creepy jingle-jangle piano and a disorientation that not only reminds the listener of The Cure, but also reclaims the darkness for Gorillaz. This is not the darkness of their past two albums but the essence of what Gorillaz is, something absent for a decade. Even so, the Demon Days-style “Pac-Man” is the closest to a throwback. This is not a nostalgia trip: it’s a virtual band rediscovering its identity when we need them most. 

It’s doom and gloom with room for carefree, hedonistic satire. Rightfully Beck-ish jam “The Valley Of The Pagans” takes a lighthearted look at Hollywood’s escapism; it’s a trap (“it feels so good to have a perfect soul, it feels so good to be in total control”), but does it really matter? Beck and 2-D bounce off each other, speeding down California’s sacred highways to nowhere in particular. There is a remembered mission in “The Lost Chord,” a break away from the city to wander through the desert night or the forest’s, meandering purposefully, with guest Leee John’s mystifying vocals keeping you locked in the groove.

The songs on the main album are eleven tracks of Gorillaz’s best, and even though the six bonus tracks don’t have that special “hit quality,” these more experimental and lowkey tracks are not to be overlooked. Last year I saw rap duo Earthgang perform on UC Berkeley’s campus after my first week, the best part for the unfamiliar being the “F*** Donald Trump” chant near the end. They have reappeared on “Opium,” the longest track on the record, to contemplate the president’s most impactful failure: his mismanagement of the coronavirus. If there is one criticism of Song Machine it’s that some of these amazing songs should have been longer, not only because they sounded amazing, but also because some of these “episodes” needed room to breathe. 

“Pink Phantom” could have used a longer run time to bask in its own beauty, and “Chalk Tablet Towers” could’ve benefited from a blocky (maybe even chalky) guitar solo from St. Vincent, who is instead relegated to background vocals. “Opium” is quite long, but the length allows for a satisfying instrumental introduction, building up so steadily to Johnny Venus’s visceral opening, “I’ve been cooped up for a minute.” In a normal world, this wouldn’t carry universal relatability, which is just another reminder of how this album’s incubation shaped it as not just a mere observation but as a document to our time. 2-D and Earthgang reminisce on the pre-Covid era, but take a more positive spin by reminding us what we can do, and what we ought to keep in mind when the moment passes.

Having followed Japan’s CHAI for years now, it was a joy to see the all-female rock band featured on the track,“MLS” alongside JPEGMAFIA. An odd pairing for sure: the former a body-positivity pumping, precise machine programmed with source code from groups like Tom Tom Club and Justice, and the latter a rapper with an eye for satire and a sometimes haunting sense of humor. Taking on the music industry, JPEGMAFIA’s intense flows on the hypocrisy and exploitation of corporate shillery is calmed by CHAI’s seeming indifference; you’re in it for the music and not the money anyways, right? Why bother with all the noise, both artists are known for their unique, in some ways revolutionary, sounds, styles, and stories. It seems as though positive attitudes have helped them remain themselves, even when the suits have attempted to fit square pegs in round holes. 

Since the closing track “How Far?,” was released in May to pay respect to Tony Allen’s passing, this is the last new song to fans who have followed the project. It’s fitting that an album so dedicated to reclaiming and updating Gorillaz’s purpose has a major throwback right at the end: the harmonica on “MLS” is not only present in CHAI’s early work such as“ぴーちくぱーちくきゅーちく” (Pichiku Pachiku Cuchiku), but also in “Tomorrow Comes Today,” one of the greatest songs off Gorillaz’s 2001 debut. Albarn and company dug deep into their now decades-spanning history here. 

“How Far?” benefits in the context of the album, where the musical creativity, gothic bluntness, and power of collaboration come to a head. Guests Skepta and Tony Allen represent, maybe better than any other matchup, the new talent Gorillaz showcases and the old talent it reveres and revitalizes. Skepta’s bars are a call to action, the “wah gwaan, brudda” a Jamaican phrase for “what’s up,” and his reflections on fame summon the grandiose voice of the exalted Allen, whose voice is as potent as his drumming on the track. For an album full of greats and newcomers, most new to the world of Gorillaz (Kano rapped on 2010’s Plastic Beach), the end is a correction: Albarn and Allen had long worked on projects like The Good, the Bad and the Queen and Rocket Juice and The Moon; he was long overdue to appear on a Gorillaz piece. For fans of Allen’s work with Fela Kuti and Africa ‘70 there are references aplenty peppered throughout this closing inquiry. 

This is probably the healthiest, quickest, and best binge I can recommend for these oddest of hours, and it’s already been renewed for a second season. Don’t miss out!

Written by Stanley Quiros