Gorillaz, review: brilliant music, mind-boggling visuals, and 20,000 people going bananas

As London’s O2 Arena reopened for business, crowds swarmed beneath the Millennium Dome to queue patiently at the security gates with smiles on their faces, cheerfully displaying vaccination cards or screenshots of negative Covid tests. The mood was giddy before a note had even been played. Then the lights dimmed, a voice called out “Hello? Is anyone there?” and the band was on stage, launching into the punky thrash and throb of M1 A1. And the whole place just erupted.

For the next two hours, the floor of the arena heaved with bodies, singing, yelling, dancing. On the upper tiers, people stood and waved phones in the dark like glittering stars. The sight of 20,000 people celebrating together has never not been something to behold, inspiring feelings of community that bring human warmth to the entertainment extravaganzas at such vast and otherwise soulless venues as the O2. London audiences, though, have a reputation for reserve, waiting to be impressed before they grant the benediction of applause.

But not any more, apparently. “My goodness,” gasped frontman Damon Albarn. “I feel like you’ve come back so much stronger!” The joyous mood of the audience transmitted to the band and was returned redoubled in a positive feedback loop of good feeling. Will such a reawakened sense of gratitude and appreciation will be sustained? Was this a one-off celebration or the first indication of a post-pandemic shift in attitudes to live music?

The Gorillaz were certainly the band for such an occasion, a sprawling multifarious multimedia ensemble playing party songs for the end of the world. Every Planet We Reach Is Dead, Kids with Guns, Plastic Beach, Demon Dayz – the song titles resonate with apocalyptic foreboding, but the Gorillaz’ cartoonish persona employs humour to defend against pessimism.

“It’s a strange time to be alive” warbled The Cure’s Robert Smith on dreamy anthem Strange Timez, the Godfather of Goth arriving as the first of many starry guests. Meanwhile, Albarn in a pink jacket prowled the lip of the stage, leading the crowd in a chant of “Are we the last living souls?” The response suggested that even if that was to prove the case, Gorillaz fans are determined to go out dancing.

Concocted by multi-instrumental singer-songwriter and Blur frontman Albarn with artist Jamie Hewlett as an imaginary cartoon band, Gorillaz have evolved into something unique. The mind boggling, sense-dazzling impact of Hewlett’s visuals counterintuitively enables Gorillaz to put on quite an old-fashioned live show. With one central screen showing Hewlett’s cartoons and some coloured lights and dry ice, it is not exactly Pink Floyd or U2.

Occupying the stage were 13 musicians playing a sophisticated melange of punk, funk, reggae, dub, jazz, soul, hip hop and electro, while Albarn interacted with a stream of guests including Happy Monday’s grizzled wordsmith Shaun Ryder, dazzling rapper Little Simz, post punk bass legend Peter Hook, eighties soul veteran Leee John and stage-diving rock duo Slaves.

What Albarn has achieved with Gorillaz may be unmatched in pop history, the Britpop star enjoying a sustained second wave of global success as a cutting-edge hero to a whole new generation of listeners, turning his eclectic musical tastes into fresh pop gold. Their creator is evidently having the time of his life.

Once he dropped his jacket, the 53-year-old frontman looked less like a pop supremo than an unshaven old muso in a dumpy black T-shirt and baggy lockdown pants. When the fantastic Malian singer-songwriter Fatouma Diawara arrived in an imperial African dress to sing the gorgeous Désolé, it was like witnessing the Queen of Sheba duet with a cheeky goatherd. Yet the very essence of the Gorillaz appears in surprising collisions between such apparently disconnected worlds. “It’s such a joy to be back with the people communing together,” said Albarn, grinning with goofy delight. The people clearly concurred.