Plastic Beach
Encyclopedia
Plastic Beach is the third studio album by British virtual band
and alternative hip hop
supergroup
Gorillaz
, released 3 March 2010 on Parlophone
and Virgin Records
. Conceived from an unfinished Gorillaz project called Carousel, the album was recorded during June 2008 to November 2009 and produced primarily by group co-creator Damon Albarn
. It features guest appearances by several artists, including Snoop Dogg
, Gruff Rhys
, De La Soul
, Bobby Womack
, Mos Def
, Lou Reed
, Mick Jones
, Mark E. Smith
, Paul Simonon
, Bashy
, Kano
, Little Dragon
and the Hypnotic Brass Ensemble
.
The album debuted at number two on the UK Albums Chart
, selling 74,000 copies in its first week. In the United States, it debuted at number two on the Billboard 200
with first-week sales of 112,000 copies, and it also charted within the top-ten in several other countries. Upon its release, Plastic Beach received generally positive reviews from most music critics.
and artist Jamie Hewlett
, began working on a new Gorillaz project in November 2007 called Carousel, which evolved into Plastic Beach, the group's third studio album. In the November 2007 issue of Q
, when asked what his top priority for 2008 was, Damon Albarn replied "Well, I'm doing the next Gorillaz thing, but it won't be called Gorillaz." In the February 2008 Gorillaz-Unofficial interview, Jamie Hewlett elaborated on this, saying "I think the idea behind it is that it's like how The Who
presented their movies – Tommy
and Quadrophenia
and so on. Those were presented as by 'The Who' even though none of the members of the band were in the movies. I don't think anyone from The Who was in Quadrophenia. But it's the same people working on it, that's the principle." In a July 2008 interview with The Observer
he also said, "Gorillaz now to us is not like four animated characters any more — it's more like an organisation of people doing new projects. [...] That's my ideal model — Gorillaz is a group of people who gave you this, and now want to give you new stuff."
In the Observer interview, Hewlett said that there is "a new project which Damon and I are working on now, called Carousel, which is even bigger and more difficult than Monkey
, and it isn't going to fit anywhere and no one's going to like it, ha ha ha! We've started work — I've done a lot of visuals and Damon's done a lot of music but we haven't figured out how they're going to fit together. I can't say much about it yet but it's sort of like a film, but not with one narrative story. There's many stories, told around a bigger story, set to music, and done in live action, animation, all different styles, well... originally it was a film but now we think it's a film and it's a stage thing as well and... look, it's basically us doing what the fuck we want without worrying about whether it's for a record company or a film company or whatever. So I'm not sure how it'll pan out, or even if it will happen. But Damon's written around 70 songs for it, and I've got great plans for the visuals, but right now, at this moment, it's still just a really good idea." Carousel was to be about the mystical aspects of Britain.
. Hewlett said that from their work on Monkey, "we just learned more about what we do, musically and artistically. That's a great place to come at when we come to another Gorillaz album. It doesn't have to be animation and music". Hewlett also expressed annoyance at having to draw the band members again: "I'm so fucking bored of drawing those characters. But then we had a moment where we had a new angle on it... I'm gonna adapt them". In a later interview Hewlett said: "they'll be the same characters, but a little bit older and told in a different way".
Albarn said in September 2008 that he wanted "to work with an incredibly eclectic, surprising cast of people". As with previous Gorillaz albums, Plastic Beach features a number of collaborations with other musicians and music groups. The album features Snoop Dogg
, Hypnotic Brass Ensemble
, Kano
, Bashy
, Bobby Womack
, Mos Def
, Gruff Rhys
, De La Soul
, Little Dragon
, Mark E. Smith
, Lou Reed
, Mick Jones
, Paul Simonon
, Yukimi Nagano
, sinfonia ViVA
and The Lebanese National Orchestra for Oriental Arabic Music.
in March 2009 to record with the National Orchestra for Oriental Arabic Music. The following month, he recorded with Derby
-based orchestra sinfonia ViVa. Grime
MCs Kano and Bashy, who feature on "White Flag", both had the flu during recording. Kano said "We weren't feeling great, the music was out of our comfort zone, it could have been a complete disaster". Bobby Womack knew nothing about Gorillaz and was initially unsure about the collaboration, however, his daughter liked Gorillaz and convinced him to do it. Womack was told to sing whatever was on his mind during the recording of "Stylo". "I was in there for an hour going crazy about love and politics, getting it off my chest", said Womack. After an hour of recording, Womack, a diabetic, started to pass out. He was sat down and given a banana, before waking up minutes later. "Sweepstakes", the first song Mos Def recorded with Gorillaz, was done in one take. Mos Def described the song as "one of the greatest things as an MC that I've ever done". Mick Jones and Paul Simonon completed their portion of the title track "Plastic Beach" in a day.
"This record has only scratched the surface of [that] period of work and the sort of adventures we went on," he said. The unreleased material is "some really out-there stuff, which hopefully will see the light of day at some point". Among these is a song Gorillaz wanted to record with Engelbert Humperdinck
. "He was supposed to do it, but then he declined, which was a real shame," Albarn explained to New York magazine. "It's a very dramatic song, very moving. Arabic strings. It's imagining Earth losing its gravitational pull and starting to fall." Even without Humperdinck, the tune will eventually be released. "I'm going to finish that off," Albarn said. "It just needs the vocal. We've made contact with Indian singer Asha Bhosle
and I think it's definitely going to happen. I'll maybe duet with her; the song has these answering phrases."
Several musicians who collaborated on songs for the album did not end up having all or any of their songs appear on the final album; some guests announced to have collaborated with the band do not feature on the album. British garage rock
band The Horrors
were invited to play on the album after Albarn heard their 2009 album Primary Colours
. They recorded a track with Albarn, but no songs with the band appear on the final album. In an interview with Entertainment Weekly
, Posdnuos
of De La Soul
said that the group had provided vocals on two songs for the album, "Electric Shock" and "Sloped Tropics". De La Soul only features on one song on the album, titled "Superfast Jellyfish
". Gruff Rhys
recorded two songs — "Superfast Jellyfish" and "Leviathan". The latter, described by Rhys as "more of a night-time song, a three o'clock in the morning, speeding down the autobahn evading West German police-type track", does not feature on the album. Mos Def
said that he collaborated with Albarn on three songs; however, Def only appears on two songs on the album. Albarn had previously announced that musician Barry Gibb
would feature on the album but Gibb did not turn up to any recording sessions. Animated Gorillaz bassist Murdoc said the band had collaborated with actress Una Stubbs
.
of The Times
calls Plastic Beach a pop
and concept album
. Allmusic editor Stephen Thomas Erlewine
notes "Damon’s painstaking pancultural pop junk-mining [...] when hip-hop
juts up against Brit-pop
", adding that "the overall album accentuates moody texture over pop hook
s.". Pitchfork Media
's Sean Fennessey writes that "ornate Village Green Preservation Society-style pop [...] dominates" the album, while commenting that "Albarn dips into Krautrock
, funk
, and dubstep
, as well as the weary, more melodic music he's been perfecting for much of last decade—sort of an electronic
take on baroque pop
." Danny Eccleston of Mojo
views that the album reprises the "combination of stupid-fresh pop melody, 21st-century hip hop substructure and catholic cast of collaborators" of Demon Days. Music writer Miles Marshall Lewis
of The Village Voice
perceives "funky electroclash" and "hip-hop inflections" in the album's music.
Albarn said in an interview, "I'm making this one the most pop record I've ever made in many ways, but with all my experience to try and at least present something that has got depth." He added, "I suppose what I've done with this Gorillaz record is I've tried to connect pop sensibility with ... trying to make people understand the essential melancholy of buying a ready made meal in loads of plastic packaging. People who watch X Factor
might have some emotional connection to these things, this detritus that accompanies what seems to be the most important thing in people's eyes, the celebrity voyeurism
."
The first time Albarn went to Mali, he was taken to a landfill where he saw people "taking every little bit, a little bit of fabric to the fabric regenerators, or the metal and the cans to the ironsmiths and the aluminium recyclers, and it goes on and by the time you get to the road, they're selling stuff." When Albarn went to a landfill outside of London to record the sound of seagulls for the album, he noticed a juxtaposition between the way the two countries dealt with rubbish. "They've got more snakes... like adders, grass snakes, slow worms, toads, frogs, newts, all kinds of rodents, all kinds of squirrels, a massive amount of squirrels, a massive amount of foxes, and obviously, seagulls. [...] This is part of the new ecology. And for the first time I saw the world in a new way. I've always felt, I'm trying to get across on this new record, the idea that plastic, we see it as being against nature but it's come out of nature. We didn't create plastic, nature created plastic. And just seeing the snakes like living in the warmth of decomposing plastic bags. They like it. It was a strange kind of optimism that I felt... but trying to get that into pop music is a challenge, anyway. But important."
Albarn says the album maintains a lot of the melancholy from Carousel. He worked hard on making his lyrics and melodies clear on the album. "Loads of orchestral stuff" was recorded but only a fraction made it onto the final album. On 14 January 2009 Damon Albarn
appeared on BBC Radio 1
with animated bass player Murdoc Niccals and played a selection of songs including four demos for Plastic Beach they included: "Electric Shock" which features Derby-based Orchestra sinfonia ViVA
(though this songs does not appear on the album though has certain elements of it used on the "Rhinestone Eyes
" track), the then demo for "Stylo
" known formally as "Binge", the demo for "Broken", and the demo for" To Binge", which was known under the name as: "Plastic Starfish", yet still featured guest vocalist: Yukimi Nagano
of Little Dragon
.
. On 14 January 2009, Albarn made an appearance as a guest DJ on BBC Radio 1
, premiering demos of three new Gorillaz songs — "Electric Shock", "Broken" and "Stylo". "Stylo" went to be heavily edited in its final version, while "Broken" remained mostly unchanged. "Electric Shock" did not make the album, though samples of the song were used in "Rhinestone Eyes", as well as the intro orchestral separated into bonus track "Three Hearts, Seven Seas, Twelve Moons".
On 20 January 2010, the official Gorillaz website was heavily revamped to fit the Plastic Beach theme. Over a period of time, a numerous amount of short clips were posted on the site, mainly showing various shots of a large Plastic Beach model backed by segments of new Gorillaz music. Out of the 13 short clips, only 2 of the clips had audio that would eventually end up on the album. The tracks were "White Flag" and "Pirate's Progress" (an extended version of the Orchestral Intro found on the album). Also on the website was a countdown timer, which on 23 February 2010 counted down to zero. After a significant delay, a new full Kong studios-esque interactive Plastic Beach "Beachsite" was uploaded onto the website, opening certain sections of Plastic Beach to be visited by guests.
On 21 January 2010, Gorillaz member Murdoc "took over" NME Radio
and Yahoo!
Radio. He played a 45 minute set of songs while providing exposition on the story of Gorillaz. A total of five broadcasts were uploaded online, leading to the release of the album. All five are now available on the official Gorillaz website.
Similar to the previous album, short animated "idents" have been released for fictional band members Murdoc, 2D, Russel, and the Noodle cyborg. The first depicts Murdoc fleeing from an unknown, rifle-wielding assailant (featuring a clip of "Three Hearts, Seven Seas, Twelve Moons" in the background), and the second depicts 2D's abduction and transportation to Plastic Beach by a masked figure featuring (with a snippet of the instrumental version of "Rhinestone Eyes"). The track can be found as a bonus track along with "Pirate's Progress" on the iTunes Deluxe edition. Russel's ident has him stomping off of the edge of a pier and diving into the ocean, presumably headed to Plastic Beach for reasons unknown. The fourth feature a zoom in on the cyborg, its face plate open. A fifth ident has been released, showing a luxury cruise sail being bombarded by torpedoes coming from planes flying above it. A crew member rushes over to cabin 13 to warn a passenger, who is revealed to be Noodle (wearing the Oni Mask), that the cruise is under attack by pirates and he was told to escort her to the lifeboats. Noodle then grabs her briefcase and opens it, revealing a gun, and passes the crew member while heading out, presumably to face the pirates. Noodle's ident acts as a trailer to the "On Melancholy Hill" music video, which was released on 15 June.
On 26 February 2010, a "minimix" of the album was made available on the official website to download for free. The minimix is an eight-minute composition of songs from the album, a number of which had not been previously released.
"Welcome to the World of the Plastic Beach", "Rhinestone Eyes" and "White Flag" were premiered on the Australian radio station Triple J
on 28 February 2010, in respective order, at one hour intervals. On 1 March 2010, NPR debuted the entire album via streaming. Later on in the day, the album also become available for streaming at Guardian.co.uk
.
with first week sales of 74,000 copies. The album also debuted at number two on the U.S. Billboard 200
chart, having sold 112,000 copies in its first week, of which 62,000 were digital copies. As of 25 March 2010, Plastic Beach sold 8,136 copies in Japan and debuted at seventeenth place on the Oricon
albums chart. Selling 13,822 copies in France, Plastic Beach debuted at second place on the SNEP
albums chart.
. Allmusic writer Stephen Thomas Erlewine called it "the first Gorillaz album to play like a soundtrack to a cartoon", writing "which isn’t entirely a bad thing, because as Albarn grows as a composer, he’s a master of subtly shifting moods and intricately threaded allusions, often creating richly detailed collages that are miniature marvels." Q
s David Everley described it as "some of the most forward-thinking pop you'll hear this or any year." Mark Beaumont of BBC Music
called Plastic Beach "not just one of the best records of 2010, but a release to stand alongside the greatest Albarn’s ever been involved with and a new benchmark for collaborative music as a whole." Pitchfork Media
writer Sean Fennessey called Damon Albarn's compositions "blatantly gorgeous", stating "The one-time Blur frontman has transcended some of the post-modern artifice of this project, and created the group's most affecting and uniquely inviting album. Joke's over, Gorillaz are real". Andy Gill of The Independent
gave it 4 out of 5 stars and wrote favourably of its guest contributors, particularly Mos Def and Bobby Womack on the track "Stylo". Drowned in Sound
writer Wendy Roby gave it an 8/10 rating and stated "past the pop songs, past the soaring (and let’s not make any bones about it, this album soars in places) this is a supremely clever album." Rolling Stone
s Rob Sheffield cited it as "Gorillaz's third excellent album in a row".
However, Los Angeles Times
writer Mikael Wood gave the album 1½ out of 4 stars and stated "Too many of these 16 hazy, half-crazy tracks sound like undercooked studio goofs". Wood panned its second half and wrote that it "plays like one long, jammy drone, with none of Albarn's melodic or lyrical gifts on display". Danny Eccleston of Mojo
gave it 3 out of 5 stars and wrote "Albarn and co's eco-parable is loud but not clear." The Washington Post
s Allison Stewart viewed its content as excessive, writing "Plastic Beach, long and synth-crazy and diffuse, can be a slog, a potentially great album suffering from an excess of everything." Entertainment Weekly
s Leah Greenblatt viewed its "sonic drift" as "dull, and even dispiriting" in the album's second half, stating "In the end, Beach offers a vision of the future as digitised kitsch: groovy, yes, but lonely too". Jon Caramanica of The New York Times
viewed its music as "thin and inconsequential, car-commercial electronic funk and tension-free hip-hop", while writing "It’s an appealing mess, moving at a fever pitch until swelling to something like an enthused climax. But still, a mess". Nick Annan of Clash
gave it a 7/10 rating and stated "Of course, there’s a lot [sic] here to take in and maybe it just needs a fair few listens to fully digest it – the sign of any album worth its salt." The Guardian
s Alexis Petridis commended Damon Albarn for his "kaleidoscopic musical ambition", and wrote "Not all of Plastic Beachs concoctions work... but there's something hugely impressive about Albarn's ability to coax artists out of their comfort zone."
Giving it 3 out of 4 stars, Chicago Tribune
writer Greg Kot
viewed the album as "slightly less immediate" than previous Gorillaz albums, but praised Albarn's execution, writing "Albarn’s great talent is in bringing together seemingly mismatched elements from different cultures, genres and generations and creating something wonderful". Despite writing that it "runs out of steam toward the end", The A.V. Club
s Noel Murray gave Plastic Beach a B+ rating and perceived it as a "more urgent and less fiddly" improvement over its predecessors. Uncut
gave it 4 out of 5 stars and called it "a brilliant concept album, full of perfect pop singles." NME
gave Plastic Beach a 7/10 rating and stated "So what is Gorillaz at the start of a new decade? [...] What it definitely still is, though, is good music." In a generally positive review, Miles Marshall Lewis
of The Village Voice
wrote favourably of its "guest stars and gravitas", calling the album "by turns atmospheric ('Glitter Freeze'), capricious ('Pirate Jet'), and electronically funky ('Rhinestone Eyes')". Despite writing that it "isn't an artistic triumph or grand satirical gesture", PopMatters
writer Michael Kabran gave the album a 7/10 rating and called it "an enjoyable ride and is the best place to start if you just want a taste of Albarn’s post-Blur musical prowess and Hewlett’s animation wizardry". Spin
s Jon Dolan called it "a jumble" and commended Albarn for his production. In a rave review of the album, Huw Jones of Slant Magazine
praised Albarn's musicianship and wrote "Plastic Beach provides the almighty shakeup that pop music has needed for some time". Pete Paphides of The Times
stated "this concept group has delivered its most fully realised concept album".
Pitchfork Media
placed it at number 35 on its list "The Top 50 Albums of 2010".
"Plastic Beach" was released in a total of five editions, many of which contain a multitude of exclusive features. These are shown below:
Virtual band
In music, a virtual band is any group whose members are not corporeal musicians, but animated characters...
and alternative hip hop
Alternative hip hop
Alternative hip hop is a sub-genre of hip hop music. Allmusic defines it as follows: -Origin:...
supergroup
SuperGroup
SuperGroup is a 2006 reality show on VH1 that follows five well-known hard rock and heavy metal musicians over a 12-day period where they live together in a Las Vegas mansion in order to create, plan and perform a live show together...
Gorillaz
Gorillaz
Gorillaz is an English musical project created in 1998 by Damon Albarn and Jamie Hewlett. This project consists of Gorillaz music itself and an extensive fictional universe depicting a "virtual band" of cartoon characters...
, released 3 March 2010 on Parlophone
Parlophone
Parlophone is a record label that was founded in Germany in 1896 by the Carl Lindström Company as Parlophon. The British branch was formed in 1923 as "Parlophone" which developed a reputation in the 1920s as a leading jazz label. It was acquired in 1927 by the Columbia Graphophone Company which...
and Virgin Records
Virgin Records
Virgin Records is a British record label founded by English entrepreneur Richard Branson, Simon Draper, and Nik Powell in 1972. The company grew to be a worldwide music phenomenon, with platinum performers such as Roy Orbison, Devo, Genesis, Keith Richards, Janet Jackson, Culture Club, Lenny...
. Conceived from an unfinished Gorillaz project called Carousel, the album was recorded during June 2008 to November 2009 and produced primarily by group co-creator Damon Albarn
Damon Albarn
Damon Albarn is an English singer-songwriter and record producer who has been involved in many high profile projects, coming to prominence as the frontman and primary songwriter of Britpop band Blur...
. It features guest appearances by several artists, including Snoop Dogg
Snoop Dogg
Calvin Cordozar Broadus, Jr. , better known by his stage name Snoop Dogg, is an American rapper, record producer, and actor. Snoop is best known as a rapper in the West Coast hip hop scene, and for being one of Dr. Dre's most notable protégés. Snoop Dogg was a Crip gang member while in high school...
, Gruff Rhys
Gruff Rhys
Gruffydd Maredudd Bowen Rhys is a Welsh musician, performing solo and with several bands, including Super Furry Animals who obtained mainstream success in the 1990s. He also most recently formed the electro-pop outfit Neon Neon with Boom Bip. Their album Stainless Style was nominated for the 2008...
, De La Soul
De La Soul
De La Soul is an American hip hop trio formed in 1987 on Long Island, New York. The band is best known for their eclectic sampling, quirky lyrics, and their contributions to the evolution of the jazz rap and alternative hip hop subgenres...
, Bobby Womack
Bobby Womack
Robert Dwayne "Bobby" Womack is an American singer-songwriter and musician. An active recording artist since the early 1960s where he started his career as the lead singer of his family musical group The Valentinos and as Sam Cooke's backing guitarist, Womack's career has spanned more than 40...
, Mos Def
Mos Def
Dante Terrell Smith is an American actor and Emcee known by the stage names Mos Def and Yasiin Bey. He started his hip hop career in a group called Urban Thermo Dynamics, after which he appeared on albums by Da Bush Babees and De La Soul. With Talib Kweli, he formed the duo Black Star, which...
, Lou Reed
Lou Reed
Lewis Allan "Lou" Reed is an American rock musician, songwriter, and photographer. He is best known as guitarist, vocalist, and principal songwriter of The Velvet Underground, and for his successful solo career, which has spanned several decades...
, Mick Jones
Mick Jones (The Clash)
Michael Geoffrey "Mick" Jones is the former lead guitarist, secondary vocalist and co-founder for the British punk rock band The Clash until his dismissal in 1983. He went on to form the band Big Audio Dynamite with Don Letts before line-up changes led to the formation of Big Audio Dynamite II and...
, Mark E. Smith
Mark E. Smith
Mark Edward Smith is the lead singer, lyricist, frontman, and only constant member of the English post-punk band The Fall.-Early life:...
, Paul Simonon
Paul Simonon
Paul Gustave Simonon is an English musician and artist best known as the bass guitarist for punk rock band The Clash. Recent work includes his involvement in the album The Good, the Bad & the Queen with Damon Albarn, Simon Tong and Tony Allen, released in January 2007...
, Bashy
Bashy
Ashley Thomas , better known by his stage name Bashy, is an English recording artist and actor. He rose to prominence in 2007 after the release of his controversial track "Black Boys".-Early life:...
, Kano
Kano (rapper)
Kane Brett Robinson , better known as Kano and also known as Kane O, is an English rapper and actor. His grandparents came to England as immigrants from Jamaica. He was formerly a key member of east London’s N.A.S.T.Y...
, Little Dragon
Little Dragon
Little Dragon are a Swedish electronic band, formed in Gothenburg in 1996. It consists of Swedish-Japanese singer Yukimi Nagano and her close high school friends Erik Bodin , Fredrik Källgren Wallin and Håkan Wirenstrand .Little Dragon's first release was the double A-side 7" single...
and the Hypnotic Brass Ensemble
Hypnotic Brass Ensemble
Hypnotic Brass Ensemble is a 9-piece, Chicago-based brass group featuring 8 sons of Phil Cohran on horns.Originally from Chicago, the brothers started as a street ensemble before recording in 2004. They have performed with Mos Def, Aquilla Sadalla, Phil Cohran, The Recipe, Nomadic Massive, Tony...
.
The album debuted at number two on the UK Albums Chart
UK Albums Chart
The UK Albums Chart is a list of albums ranked by physical and digital sales in the United Kingdom. It is compiled every week by The Official Charts Company and broadcast on a Sunday on BBC Radio 1 , and published in Music Week magazine and on the OCC website .To qualify for the UK albums chart...
, selling 74,000 copies in its first week. In the United States, it debuted at number two on the Billboard 200
Billboard 200
The Billboard 200 is a ranking of the 200 highest-selling music albums and EPs in the United States, published weekly by Billboard magazine. It is frequently used to convey the popularity of an artist or groups of artists...
with first-week sales of 112,000 copies, and it also charted within the top-ten in several other countries. Upon its release, Plastic Beach received generally positive reviews from most music critics.
Carousel
Creators of Gorillaz, musician Damon AlbarnDamon Albarn
Damon Albarn is an English singer-songwriter and record producer who has been involved in many high profile projects, coming to prominence as the frontman and primary songwriter of Britpop band Blur...
and artist Jamie Hewlett
Jamie Hewlett
Jamie Christopher Hewlett is an English comic book artist and designer. He is known for being the co-creator of the comic Tank Girl and co-creator of the virtual band Gorillaz.-Biography:...
, began working on a new Gorillaz project in November 2007 called Carousel, which evolved into Plastic Beach, the group's third studio album. In the November 2007 issue of Q
Q (magazine)
Q is a popular music magazine published monthly in the United Kingdom.Founders Mark Ellen and David Hepworth were dismayed by the music press of the time, which they felt was ignoring a generation of older music buyers who were buying CDs — then still a new technology...
, when asked what his top priority for 2008 was, Damon Albarn replied "Well, I'm doing the next Gorillaz thing, but it won't be called Gorillaz." In the February 2008 Gorillaz-Unofficial interview, Jamie Hewlett elaborated on this, saying "I think the idea behind it is that it's like how The Who
The Who
The Who are an English rock band formed in 1964 by Roger Daltrey , Pete Townshend , John Entwistle and Keith Moon . They became known for energetic live performances which often included instrument destruction...
presented their movies – Tommy
Tommy (film)
Tommy is a 1975 British musical film based upon The Who's 1969 rock opera album musical Tommy. It was directed by Ken Russell and featured a star-studded cast, including the band members themselves...
and Quadrophenia
Quadrophenia (film)
Quadrophenia is a 1979 British film, loosely based around the 1973 rock opera of the same name by The Who. The film stars Phil Daniels as a Mod named Jimmy. It was directed by Franc Roddam in his feature directing debut...
and so on. Those were presented as by 'The Who' even though none of the members of the band were in the movies. I don't think anyone from The Who was in Quadrophenia. But it's the same people working on it, that's the principle." In a July 2008 interview with The Observer
The Observer
The Observer is a British newspaper, published on Sundays. In the same place on the political spectrum as its daily sister paper The Guardian, which acquired it in 1993, it takes a liberal or social democratic line on most issues. It is the world's oldest Sunday newspaper.-Origins:The first issue,...
he also said, "Gorillaz now to us is not like four animated characters any more — it's more like an organisation of people doing new projects. [...] That's my ideal model — Gorillaz is a group of people who gave you this, and now want to give you new stuff."
In the Observer interview, Hewlett said that there is "a new project which Damon and I are working on now, called Carousel, which is even bigger and more difficult than Monkey
Monkey: Journey to the West
Monkey: Journey to the West is a stage adaptation of the 16th Century Chinese novel Journey to the West, by Wu Cheng'en. It was conceived and created by the Chinese actor and director Chen Shi-zheng with the British musician Damon Albarn and British artist Jamie Hewlett.-Development:In 2004,...
, and it isn't going to fit anywhere and no one's going to like it, ha ha ha! We've started work — I've done a lot of visuals and Damon's done a lot of music but we haven't figured out how they're going to fit together. I can't say much about it yet but it's sort of like a film, but not with one narrative story. There's many stories, told around a bigger story, set to music, and done in live action, animation, all different styles, well... originally it was a film but now we think it's a film and it's a stage thing as well and... look, it's basically us doing what the fuck we want without worrying about whether it's for a record company or a film company or whatever. So I'm not sure how it'll pan out, or even if it will happen. But Damon's written around 70 songs for it, and I've got great plans for the visuals, but right now, at this moment, it's still just a really good idea." Carousel was to be about the mystical aspects of Britain.
Concept
Damon Albarn got the idea for Plastic Beach while on a beach next to his house: "I was just looking for all the plastic within the sand", he said. On 17 September 2008, Albarn and Jamie Hewlett announced that they would be doing another Gorillaz album in an interview with CBC NewsCBC News
CBC News is the department within the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation responsible for the news gathering and production of news programs on CBC television, radio and online services...
. Hewlett said that from their work on Monkey, "we just learned more about what we do, musically and artistically. That's a great place to come at when we come to another Gorillaz album. It doesn't have to be animation and music". Hewlett also expressed annoyance at having to draw the band members again: "I'm so fucking bored of drawing those characters. But then we had a moment where we had a new angle on it... I'm gonna adapt them". In a later interview Hewlett said: "they'll be the same characters, but a little bit older and told in a different way".
Albarn said in September 2008 that he wanted "to work with an incredibly eclectic, surprising cast of people". As with previous Gorillaz albums, Plastic Beach features a number of collaborations with other musicians and music groups. The album features Snoop Dogg
Snoop Dogg
Calvin Cordozar Broadus, Jr. , better known by his stage name Snoop Dogg, is an American rapper, record producer, and actor. Snoop is best known as a rapper in the West Coast hip hop scene, and for being one of Dr. Dre's most notable protégés. Snoop Dogg was a Crip gang member while in high school...
, Hypnotic Brass Ensemble
Hypnotic Brass Ensemble
Hypnotic Brass Ensemble is a 9-piece, Chicago-based brass group featuring 8 sons of Phil Cohran on horns.Originally from Chicago, the brothers started as a street ensemble before recording in 2004. They have performed with Mos Def, Aquilla Sadalla, Phil Cohran, The Recipe, Nomadic Massive, Tony...
, Kano
Kano (rapper)
Kane Brett Robinson , better known as Kano and also known as Kane O, is an English rapper and actor. His grandparents came to England as immigrants from Jamaica. He was formerly a key member of east London’s N.A.S.T.Y...
, Bashy
Bashy
Ashley Thomas , better known by his stage name Bashy, is an English recording artist and actor. He rose to prominence in 2007 after the release of his controversial track "Black Boys".-Early life:...
, Bobby Womack
Bobby Womack
Robert Dwayne "Bobby" Womack is an American singer-songwriter and musician. An active recording artist since the early 1960s where he started his career as the lead singer of his family musical group The Valentinos and as Sam Cooke's backing guitarist, Womack's career has spanned more than 40...
, Mos Def
Mos Def
Dante Terrell Smith is an American actor and Emcee known by the stage names Mos Def and Yasiin Bey. He started his hip hop career in a group called Urban Thermo Dynamics, after which he appeared on albums by Da Bush Babees and De La Soul. With Talib Kweli, he formed the duo Black Star, which...
, Gruff Rhys
Gruff Rhys
Gruffydd Maredudd Bowen Rhys is a Welsh musician, performing solo and with several bands, including Super Furry Animals who obtained mainstream success in the 1990s. He also most recently formed the electro-pop outfit Neon Neon with Boom Bip. Their album Stainless Style was nominated for the 2008...
, De La Soul
De La Soul
De La Soul is an American hip hop trio formed in 1987 on Long Island, New York. The band is best known for their eclectic sampling, quirky lyrics, and their contributions to the evolution of the jazz rap and alternative hip hop subgenres...
, Little Dragon
Little Dragon
Little Dragon are a Swedish electronic band, formed in Gothenburg in 1996. It consists of Swedish-Japanese singer Yukimi Nagano and her close high school friends Erik Bodin , Fredrik Källgren Wallin and Håkan Wirenstrand .Little Dragon's first release was the double A-side 7" single...
, Mark E. Smith
Mark E. Smith
Mark Edward Smith is the lead singer, lyricist, frontman, and only constant member of the English post-punk band The Fall.-Early life:...
, Lou Reed
Lou Reed
Lewis Allan "Lou" Reed is an American rock musician, songwriter, and photographer. He is best known as guitarist, vocalist, and principal songwriter of The Velvet Underground, and for his successful solo career, which has spanned several decades...
, Mick Jones
Mick Jones (The Clash)
Michael Geoffrey "Mick" Jones is the former lead guitarist, secondary vocalist and co-founder for the British punk rock band The Clash until his dismissal in 1983. He went on to form the band Big Audio Dynamite with Don Letts before line-up changes led to the formation of Big Audio Dynamite II and...
, Paul Simonon
Paul Simonon
Paul Gustave Simonon is an English musician and artist best known as the bass guitarist for punk rock band The Clash. Recent work includes his involvement in the album The Good, the Bad & the Queen with Damon Albarn, Simon Tong and Tony Allen, released in January 2007...
, Yukimi Nagano
Yukimi Nagano
Yukimi Nagano is a Swedish singer-songwriter. Nagano was born and raised in Gothenburg, Sweden to a Japanese father and Swedish-American mother; she grew up listening to American folk because of her mother, but always had an affinity for R&B.She is the vocalist of Gothenburg-based electronic band...
, sinfonia ViVA
Sinfonia ViVA
Sinfonia ViVA is a British orchestra based in Derby, United Kingdom, a professional orchestra in the East Midlands. Sinfonia ViVA gives concerts in a number of cities and venues, including the following:* Cleethorpes * Derby...
and The Lebanese National Orchestra for Oriental Arabic Music.
Recording
Albarn began recording material for a new Gorillaz album around June 2008. He travelled to BeirutBeirut
Beirut is the capital and largest city of Lebanon, with a population ranging from 1 million to more than 2 million . Located on a peninsula at the midpoint of Lebanon's Mediterranean coastline, it serves as the country's largest and main seaport, and also forms the Beirut Metropolitan...
in March 2009 to record with the National Orchestra for Oriental Arabic Music. The following month, he recorded with Derby
Derby
Derby , is a city and unitary authority in the East Midlands region of England. It lies upon the banks of the River Derwent and is located in the south of the ceremonial county of Derbyshire. In the 2001 census, the population of the city was 233,700, whilst that of the Derby Urban Area was 229,407...
-based orchestra sinfonia ViVa. Grime
Grime (music)
Grime is a style of music that emerged from Bow, East London, England in the early 2000s, primarily as a development of UK garage, dancehall, and hip hop...
MCs Kano and Bashy, who feature on "White Flag", both had the flu during recording. Kano said "We weren't feeling great, the music was out of our comfort zone, it could have been a complete disaster". Bobby Womack knew nothing about Gorillaz and was initially unsure about the collaboration, however, his daughter liked Gorillaz and convinced him to do it. Womack was told to sing whatever was on his mind during the recording of "Stylo". "I was in there for an hour going crazy about love and politics, getting it off my chest", said Womack. After an hour of recording, Womack, a diabetic, started to pass out. He was sat down and given a banana, before waking up minutes later. "Sweepstakes", the first song Mos Def recorded with Gorillaz, was done in one take. Mos Def described the song as "one of the greatest things as an MC that I've ever done". Mick Jones and Paul Simonon completed their portion of the title track "Plastic Beach" in a day.
"This record has only scratched the surface of [that] period of work and the sort of adventures we went on," he said. The unreleased material is "some really out-there stuff, which hopefully will see the light of day at some point". Among these is a song Gorillaz wanted to record with Engelbert Humperdinck
Engelbert Humperdinck
Engelbert Humperdinck was a German composer, best known for his opera, Hänsel und Gretel. Humperdinck was born at Siegburg in the Rhine Province; at the age of 67 he died in Neustrelitz, Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania.-Life:After receiving piano lessons, Humperdinck produced his first composition...
. "He was supposed to do it, but then he declined, which was a real shame," Albarn explained to New York magazine. "It's a very dramatic song, very moving. Arabic strings. It's imagining Earth losing its gravitational pull and starting to fall." Even without Humperdinck, the tune will eventually be released. "I'm going to finish that off," Albarn said. "It just needs the vocal. We've made contact with Indian singer Asha Bhosle
Asha Bhosle
Asha Bhosle is an Indian singer. She is one of the best-known and most highly-regarded Hindi playback singers in India, although she has a wider repertoire. Bhosle's career started in 1943 and has spanned over six decades. She has done playback singing for over a thousand Bollywood movies...
and I think it's definitely going to happen. I'll maybe duet with her; the song has these answering phrases."
Several musicians who collaborated on songs for the album did not end up having all or any of their songs appear on the final album; some guests announced to have collaborated with the band do not feature on the album. British garage rock
Garage rock
Garage rock is a raw form of rock and roll that was first popular in the United States and Canada from about 1963 to 1967. During the 1960s, it was not recognized as a separate music genre and had no specific name...
band The Horrors
The Horrors
The Horrors are an English band from Southend on Sea, formed in 2005. Their debut Strange House, was released in 2007 and reached number thirty-seven on the UK Albums Chart, their second album Primary Colours was released in 2009 and peaked at number 25 in the UK...
were invited to play on the album after Albarn heard their 2009 album Primary Colours
Primary Colours (album)
Primary Colours is the second studio album by British post-punk revival band The Horrors. It was released in the US on 21 April 2009, and in the UK on 4 May 2009 by XL Recordings. The album charted on the UK Albums Chart at #25. According to aggregating website Metacritic, the record was met with...
. They recorded a track with Albarn, but no songs with the band appear on the final album. In an interview with Entertainment Weekly
Entertainment Weekly
Entertainment Weekly is an American magazine, published by the Time division of Time Warner, that covers film, television, music, broadway theatre, books and popular culture...
, Posdnuos
Kelvin Mercer
Kelvin Mercer is a rapper, producer, and one-third of the hip hop trio De La Soul. He is known more famously by his alias Posdnuos, or simply Pos. He was born in the Bronx, New York and grew up in East Massapequa, New York.Mercer and David Jude Jolicoeur were childhood friends...
of De La Soul
De La Soul
De La Soul is an American hip hop trio formed in 1987 on Long Island, New York. The band is best known for their eclectic sampling, quirky lyrics, and their contributions to the evolution of the jazz rap and alternative hip hop subgenres...
said that the group had provided vocals on two songs for the album, "Electric Shock" and "Sloped Tropics". De La Soul only features on one song on the album, titled "Superfast Jellyfish
Superfast Jellyfish
"Superfast Jellyfish" is a song from Gorillaz's third album Plastic Beach. It features Gruff Rhys, lead singer of Super Furry Animals, and De La Soul, who were previously featured on the hit Gorillaz' song "Feel Good Inc."...
". Gruff Rhys
Gruff Rhys
Gruffydd Maredudd Bowen Rhys is a Welsh musician, performing solo and with several bands, including Super Furry Animals who obtained mainstream success in the 1990s. He also most recently formed the electro-pop outfit Neon Neon with Boom Bip. Their album Stainless Style was nominated for the 2008...
recorded two songs — "Superfast Jellyfish" and "Leviathan". The latter, described by Rhys as "more of a night-time song, a three o'clock in the morning, speeding down the autobahn evading West German police-type track", does not feature on the album. Mos Def
Mos Def
Dante Terrell Smith is an American actor and Emcee known by the stage names Mos Def and Yasiin Bey. He started his hip hop career in a group called Urban Thermo Dynamics, after which he appeared on albums by Da Bush Babees and De La Soul. With Talib Kweli, he formed the duo Black Star, which...
said that he collaborated with Albarn on three songs; however, Def only appears on two songs on the album. Albarn had previously announced that musician Barry Gibb
Barry Gibb
Barry Alan Crompton Gibb, CBE , is a singer, songwriter and producer. He was born in the Isle of Man to English parents. With his brothers Robin and Maurice, he formed The Bee Gees, one of the most successful pop groups of all time. The trio got their start in Australia, and found their major...
would feature on the album but Gibb did not turn up to any recording sessions. Animated Gorillaz bassist Murdoc said the band had collaborated with actress Una Stubbs
Una Stubbs
Una Stubbs is an English actress and former dancer who has appeared extensively on British television and in the theatre, and less frequently in films. She is particularly known for her roles in the sitcom Till Death Us Do Part and Aunt Sally in the children's series Worzel Gummidge.-Film and...
.
Music
Journalist Peter PaphidesPeter Paphides
Peter Paphides is a British journalist and broadcaster.Between 2005 and 2010 he was employed as the chief rock critic of The Times and presented The Times weekly music podcast for Sounds Music supplement...
of The Times
The Times
The Times is a British daily national newspaper, first published in London in 1785 under the title The Daily Universal Register . The Times and its sister paper The Sunday Times are published by Times Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary since 1981 of News International...
calls Plastic Beach a pop
Pop music
Pop music is usually understood to be commercially recorded music, often oriented toward a youth market, usually consisting of relatively short, simple songs utilizing technological innovations to produce new variations on existing themes.- Definitions :David Hatch and Stephen Millward define pop...
and concept album
Concept album
In music, a concept album is an album that is "unified by a theme, which can be instrumental, compositional, narrative, or lyrical." Commonly, concept albums tend to incorporate preconceived musical or lyrical ideas rather than being improvised or composed in the studio, with all songs contributing...
. Allmusic editor Stephen Thomas Erlewine
Stephen Thomas Erlewine
Stephen Thomas Erlewine is a senior editor for Allmusic. He is the author of many artist biographies and record reviews for Allmusic, as well as a freelance writer, occasionally contributing liner notes. He is also frontman and guitarist for the Ann Arbor-based band Who Dat?Erlewine is the nephew...
notes "Damon’s painstaking pancultural pop junk-mining [...] when hip-hop
Hip hop music
Hip hop music, also called hip-hop, rap music or hip-hop music, is a musical genre consisting of a stylized rhythmic music that commonly accompanies rapping, a rhythmic and rhyming speech that is chanted...
juts up against Brit-pop
Britpop
Britpop is a subgenre of alternative rock that originated in the United Kingdom. Britpop emerged from the British independent music scene of the early 1990s and was characterised by bands influenced by British guitar pop music of the 1960s and 1970s...
", adding that "the overall album accentuates moody texture over pop hook
Hook (music)
A hook is a musical idea, often a short riff, passage, or phrase, that is used in popular music to make a song appealing and to "catch the ear of the listener". The term generally applies to popular music, especially rock music, hip hop, dance music, and pop. In these genres, the hook is often...
s.". Pitchfork Media
Pitchfork Media
Pitchfork Media, usually known simply as Pitchfork or P4k, is a Chicago-based daily Internet publication established in 1995 that is devoted to music criticism and commentary, music news, and artist interviews. Its focus is on underground and independent music, especially indie rock...
's Sean Fennessey writes that "ornate Village Green Preservation Society-style pop [...] dominates" the album, while commenting that "Albarn dips into Krautrock
Krautrock
Krautrock is a generic name for the experimental music scenes that appeared in Germany in the late 1960s and gained popularity throughout the 1970s, especially in Britain. The term is a result of the English-speaking world's reception of the music at the time and not a reference to any one...
, funk
Funk
Funk is a music genre that originated in the mid-late 1960s when African American musicians blended soul music, jazz and R&B into a rhythmic, danceable new form of music. Funk de-emphasizes melody and harmony and brings a strong rhythmic groove of electric bass and drums to the foreground...
, and dubstep
Dubstep
Dubstep is a genre of electronic dance music that originated in south London, England. Its overall sound has been described as "tightly coiled productions with overwhelming bass lines and reverberant drum patterns, clipped samples, and occasional vocals"....
, as well as the weary, more melodic music he's been perfecting for much of last decade—sort of an electronic
Electronic music
Electronic music is music that employs electronic musical instruments and electronic music technology in its production. In general a distinction can be made between sound produced using electromechanical means and that produced using electronic technology. Examples of electromechanical sound...
take on baroque pop
Baroque pop
Baroque pop, Baroque rock, or English baroque, often used interchangeably with chamber pop/rock, is a pop and rock music subgenre which originated in the mid-1960s in the United Kingdom and United States...
." Danny Eccleston of Mojo
Mojo (magazine)
MOJO is a popular music magazine published initially by Emap, and since January 2008 by Bauer, monthly in the United Kingdom. Following the success of the magazine Q, publishers Emap were looking for a title which would cater for the burgeoning interest in classic rock music...
views that the album reprises the "combination of stupid-fresh pop melody, 21st-century hip hop substructure and catholic cast of collaborators" of Demon Days. Music writer Miles Marshall Lewis
Miles Marshall Lewis
Miles Marshall Lewis is an American pop culture critic, essayist, literary editor, fiction writer, and music journalist. He is a graduate of Morehouse College, class of 1993....
of The Village Voice
The Village Voice
The Village Voice is a free weekly newspaper and news and features website in New York City that features investigative articles, analysis of current affairs and culture, arts and music coverage, and events listings for New York City...
perceives "funky electroclash" and "hip-hop inflections" in the album's music.
Albarn said in an interview, "I'm making this one the most pop record I've ever made in many ways, but with all my experience to try and at least present something that has got depth." He added, "I suppose what I've done with this Gorillaz record is I've tried to connect pop sensibility with ... trying to make people understand the essential melancholy of buying a ready made meal in loads of plastic packaging. People who watch X Factor
The X Factor (UK)
The X Factor is a British television music competition to find new singing talent. Created by Simon Cowell, it began in September 2004 and is contested by aspiring singers drawn from public auditions. It is the originator of the international X Factor franchise. The seven series of the show to date...
might have some emotional connection to these things, this detritus that accompanies what seems to be the most important thing in people's eyes, the celebrity voyeurism
Voyeurism
In clinical psychology, voyeurism is the sexual interest in or practice of spying on people engaged in intimate behaviors, such as undressing, sexual activity, or other activity usually considered to be of a private nature....
."
The first time Albarn went to Mali, he was taken to a landfill where he saw people "taking every little bit, a little bit of fabric to the fabric regenerators, or the metal and the cans to the ironsmiths and the aluminium recyclers, and it goes on and by the time you get to the road, they're selling stuff." When Albarn went to a landfill outside of London to record the sound of seagulls for the album, he noticed a juxtaposition between the way the two countries dealt with rubbish. "They've got more snakes... like adders, grass snakes, slow worms, toads, frogs, newts, all kinds of rodents, all kinds of squirrels, a massive amount of squirrels, a massive amount of foxes, and obviously, seagulls. [...] This is part of the new ecology. And for the first time I saw the world in a new way. I've always felt, I'm trying to get across on this new record, the idea that plastic, we see it as being against nature but it's come out of nature. We didn't create plastic, nature created plastic. And just seeing the snakes like living in the warmth of decomposing plastic bags. They like it. It was a strange kind of optimism that I felt... but trying to get that into pop music is a challenge, anyway. But important."
Albarn says the album maintains a lot of the melancholy from Carousel. He worked hard on making his lyrics and melodies clear on the album. "Loads of orchestral stuff" was recorded but only a fraction made it onto the final album. On 14 January 2009 Damon Albarn
Damon Albarn
Damon Albarn is an English singer-songwriter and record producer who has been involved in many high profile projects, coming to prominence as the frontman and primary songwriter of Britpop band Blur...
appeared on BBC Radio 1
BBC Radio 1
BBC Radio 1 is a British national radio station operated by the British Broadcasting Corporation which also broadcasts internationally, specialising in current popular music and chart hits throughout the day. Radio 1 provides alternative genres after 7:00pm including electronic dance, hip hop, rock...
with animated bass player Murdoc Niccals and played a selection of songs including four demos for Plastic Beach they included: "Electric Shock" which features Derby-based Orchestra sinfonia ViVA
Sinfonia ViVA
Sinfonia ViVA is a British orchestra based in Derby, United Kingdom, a professional orchestra in the East Midlands. Sinfonia ViVA gives concerts in a number of cities and venues, including the following:* Cleethorpes * Derby...
(though this songs does not appear on the album though has certain elements of it used on the "Rhinestone Eyes
Rhinestone Eyes
"Rhinestone Eyes" is a single from Gorillaz's third studio album, Plastic Beach. Fictional band member, Murdoc Niccals, stated the following about "Rhinestone Eyes" in a 'Track by Track' commentary:...
" track), the then demo for "Stylo
Stylo (song)
"Stylo" is the first single from British alternative group Gorillaz's third studio album Plastic Beach. The song features guest vocals from Bobby Womack and Mos Def. The single was released on 26 January 2010.-Production:...
" known formally as "Binge", the demo for "Broken", and the demo for" To Binge", which was known under the name as: "Plastic Starfish", yet still featured guest vocalist: Yukimi Nagano
Yukimi Nagano
Yukimi Nagano is a Swedish singer-songwriter. Nagano was born and raised in Gothenburg, Sweden to a Japanese father and Swedish-American mother; she grew up listening to American folk because of her mother, but always had an affinity for R&B.She is the vocalist of Gothenburg-based electronic band...
of Little Dragon
Little Dragon
Little Dragon are a Swedish electronic band, formed in Gothenburg in 1996. It consists of Swedish-Japanese singer Yukimi Nagano and her close high school friends Erik Bodin , Fredrik Källgren Wallin and Håkan Wirenstrand .Little Dragon's first release was the double A-side 7" single...
.
Release and promotion
A new picture of the band was published on 9 December 2009 on the cover of the UK edition of Wired magazineWired (magazine)
Wired is a full-color monthly American magazine and on-line periodical, published since January 1993, that reports on how new and developing technology affects culture, the economy, and politics...
. On 14 January 2009, Albarn made an appearance as a guest DJ on BBC Radio 1
BBC Radio 1
BBC Radio 1 is a British national radio station operated by the British Broadcasting Corporation which also broadcasts internationally, specialising in current popular music and chart hits throughout the day. Radio 1 provides alternative genres after 7:00pm including electronic dance, hip hop, rock...
, premiering demos of three new Gorillaz songs — "Electric Shock", "Broken" and "Stylo". "Stylo" went to be heavily edited in its final version, while "Broken" remained mostly unchanged. "Electric Shock" did not make the album, though samples of the song were used in "Rhinestone Eyes", as well as the intro orchestral separated into bonus track "Three Hearts, Seven Seas, Twelve Moons".
On 20 January 2010, the official Gorillaz website was heavily revamped to fit the Plastic Beach theme. Over a period of time, a numerous amount of short clips were posted on the site, mainly showing various shots of a large Plastic Beach model backed by segments of new Gorillaz music. Out of the 13 short clips, only 2 of the clips had audio that would eventually end up on the album. The tracks were "White Flag" and "Pirate's Progress" (an extended version of the Orchestral Intro found on the album). Also on the website was a countdown timer, which on 23 February 2010 counted down to zero. After a significant delay, a new full Kong studios-esque interactive Plastic Beach "Beachsite" was uploaded onto the website, opening certain sections of Plastic Beach to be visited by guests.
On 21 January 2010, Gorillaz member Murdoc "took over" NME Radio
NME Radio
NME Radio is the radio station from NME magazine, that broadcasts in a new commercially oriented alternative music format. It first began broadcasting on 24 June 2008.- History :...
and Yahoo!
Yahoo!
Yahoo! Inc. is an American multinational internet corporation headquartered in Sunnyvale, California, United States. The company is perhaps best known for its web portal, search engine , Yahoo! Directory, Yahoo! Mail, Yahoo! News, Yahoo! Groups, Yahoo! Answers, advertising, online mapping ,...
Radio. He played a 45 minute set of songs while providing exposition on the story of Gorillaz. A total of five broadcasts were uploaded online, leading to the release of the album. All five are now available on the official Gorillaz website.
Similar to the previous album, short animated "idents" have been released for fictional band members Murdoc, 2D, Russel, and the Noodle cyborg. The first depicts Murdoc fleeing from an unknown, rifle-wielding assailant (featuring a clip of "Three Hearts, Seven Seas, Twelve Moons" in the background), and the second depicts 2D's abduction and transportation to Plastic Beach by a masked figure featuring (with a snippet of the instrumental version of "Rhinestone Eyes"). The track can be found as a bonus track along with "Pirate's Progress" on the iTunes Deluxe edition. Russel's ident has him stomping off of the edge of a pier and diving into the ocean, presumably headed to Plastic Beach for reasons unknown. The fourth feature a zoom in on the cyborg, its face plate open. A fifth ident has been released, showing a luxury cruise sail being bombarded by torpedoes coming from planes flying above it. A crew member rushes over to cabin 13 to warn a passenger, who is revealed to be Noodle (wearing the Oni Mask), that the cruise is under attack by pirates and he was told to escort her to the lifeboats. Noodle then grabs her briefcase and opens it, revealing a gun, and passes the crew member while heading out, presumably to face the pirates. Noodle's ident acts as a trailer to the "On Melancholy Hill" music video, which was released on 15 June.
On 26 February 2010, a "minimix" of the album was made available on the official website to download for free. The minimix is an eight-minute composition of songs from the album, a number of which had not been previously released.
"Welcome to the World of the Plastic Beach", "Rhinestone Eyes" and "White Flag" were premiered on the Australian radio station Triple J
Triple J
triple j is a nationally networked Australian radio station intended to appeal to listeners between the ages of 18 and 30. The government-funded station is a division of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation...
on 28 February 2010, in respective order, at one hour intervals. On 1 March 2010, NPR debuted the entire album via streaming. Later on in the day, the album also become available for streaming at Guardian.co.uk
Guardian.co.uk
guardian.co.uk, formerly known as Guardian Unlimited, is a British website owned by the Guardian Media Group. Georgina Henry is the editor...
.
Singles
The album has produced four singles .- "StyloStylo (song)"Stylo" is the first single from British alternative group Gorillaz's third studio album Plastic Beach. The song features guest vocals from Bobby Womack and Mos Def. The single was released on 26 January 2010.-Production:...
" Peak #24 in BillboardBillboard (magazine)Billboard is a weekly American magazine devoted to the music industry, and is one of the oldest trade magazines in the world. It maintains several internationally recognized music charts that track the most popular songs and albums in various categories on a weekly basis...
Alternative Charts. - "Superfast JellyfishSuperfast Jellyfish"Superfast Jellyfish" is a song from Gorillaz's third album Plastic Beach. It features Gruff Rhys, lead singer of Super Furry Animals, and De La Soul, who were previously featured on the hit Gorillaz' song "Feel Good Inc."...
" Peak #28 in UK Dance Charts. - "On Melancholy HillOn Melancholy Hill"On Melancholy Hill" is the third single from British alternative group Gorillaz' third studio album, Plastic Beach. The song was originally written by Damon Albarn during the production time for The Good The Bad and The Queen's self titled album. The single was released on 26 July 2010...
" Peak #78 in UK Singles Chart. - "Rhinestone EyesRhinestone Eyes"Rhinestone Eyes" is a single from Gorillaz's third studio album, Plastic Beach. Fictional band member, Murdoc Niccals, stated the following about "Rhinestone Eyes" in a 'Track by Track' commentary:...
" Peak #34 in Billboard Alternative Charts.
Commercial performance
Plastic Beach debuted at number two on the UK Albums ChartUK Albums Chart
The UK Albums Chart is a list of albums ranked by physical and digital sales in the United Kingdom. It is compiled every week by The Official Charts Company and broadcast on a Sunday on BBC Radio 1 , and published in Music Week magazine and on the OCC website .To qualify for the UK albums chart...
with first week sales of 74,000 copies. The album also debuted at number two on the U.S. Billboard 200
Billboard 200
The Billboard 200 is a ranking of the 200 highest-selling music albums and EPs in the United States, published weekly by Billboard magazine. It is frequently used to convey the popularity of an artist or groups of artists...
chart, having sold 112,000 copies in its first week, of which 62,000 were digital copies. As of 25 March 2010, Plastic Beach sold 8,136 copies in Japan and debuted at seventeenth place on the Oricon
Oricon
, established in 1999, is the holding company at the head of a Japanese corporate group that supplies statistics and information on music and the music industry in Japan. It started as , which was founded by Sōkō Koike in November 1967 and became known for its music charts. Oricon Inc...
albums chart. Selling 13,822 copies in France, Plastic Beach debuted at second place on the SNEP
Syndicat National de l'Edition Phonographique
The Syndicat national de l'édition phonographique is the inter-professional organization which protects the interests of the French record industry...
albums chart.
Critical response
Upon its release, Plastic Beach received generally positive reviews from most music critics, based on an aggregate score of 77/100 from MetacriticMetacritic
Metacritic.com is a website that collates reviews of music albums, games, movies, TV shows and DVDs. For each product, a numerical score from each review is obtained and the total is averaged. An excerpt of each review is provided along with a hyperlink to the source. Three colour codes of Green,...
. Allmusic writer Stephen Thomas Erlewine called it "the first Gorillaz album to play like a soundtrack to a cartoon", writing "which isn’t entirely a bad thing, because as Albarn grows as a composer, he’s a master of subtly shifting moods and intricately threaded allusions, often creating richly detailed collages that are miniature marvels." Q
Q (magazine)
Q is a popular music magazine published monthly in the United Kingdom.Founders Mark Ellen and David Hepworth were dismayed by the music press of the time, which they felt was ignoring a generation of older music buyers who were buying CDs — then still a new technology...
s David Everley described it as "some of the most forward-thinking pop you'll hear this or any year." Mark Beaumont of BBC Music
BBC Music
BBC Music is a team working in the department of Audio and Music Interactive at the BBC. Responsible for the BBC Music website - the portal site to music content across the BBC website....
called Plastic Beach "not just one of the best records of 2010, but a release to stand alongside the greatest Albarn’s ever been involved with and a new benchmark for collaborative music as a whole." Pitchfork Media
Pitchfork Media
Pitchfork Media, usually known simply as Pitchfork or P4k, is a Chicago-based daily Internet publication established in 1995 that is devoted to music criticism and commentary, music news, and artist interviews. Its focus is on underground and independent music, especially indie rock...
writer Sean Fennessey called Damon Albarn's compositions "blatantly gorgeous", stating "The one-time Blur frontman has transcended some of the post-modern artifice of this project, and created the group's most affecting and uniquely inviting album. Joke's over, Gorillaz are real". Andy Gill of The Independent
The Independent
The Independent is a British national morning newspaper published in London by Independent Print Limited, owned by Alexander Lebedev since 2010. It is nicknamed the Indy, while the Sunday edition, The Independent on Sunday, is the Sindy. Launched in 1986, it is one of the youngest UK national daily...
gave it 4 out of 5 stars and wrote favourably of its guest contributors, particularly Mos Def and Bobby Womack on the track "Stylo". Drowned in Sound
Drowned in Sound
DrownedinSound.com or DiS is a UK based music webzine financed by artist management company Silentway . The site is an editorially independent music website.-History:...
writer Wendy Roby gave it an 8/10 rating and stated "past the pop songs, past the soaring (and let’s not make any bones about it, this album soars in places) this is a supremely clever album." Rolling Stone
Rolling Stone
Rolling Stone is a US-based magazine devoted to music, liberal politics, and popular culture that is published every two weeks. Rolling Stone was founded in San Francisco in 1967 by Jann Wenner and music critic Ralph J...
s Rob Sheffield cited it as "Gorillaz's third excellent album in a row".
However, Los Angeles Times
Los Angeles Times
The Los Angeles Times is a daily newspaper published in Los Angeles, California, since 1881. It was the second-largest metropolitan newspaper in circulation in the United States in 2008 and the fourth most widely distributed newspaper in the country....
writer Mikael Wood gave the album 1½ out of 4 stars and stated "Too many of these 16 hazy, half-crazy tracks sound like undercooked studio goofs". Wood panned its second half and wrote that it "plays like one long, jammy drone, with none of Albarn's melodic or lyrical gifts on display". Danny Eccleston of Mojo
Mojo (magazine)
MOJO is a popular music magazine published initially by Emap, and since January 2008 by Bauer, monthly in the United Kingdom. Following the success of the magazine Q, publishers Emap were looking for a title which would cater for the burgeoning interest in classic rock music...
gave it 3 out of 5 stars and wrote "Albarn and co's eco-parable is loud but not clear." The Washington Post
The Washington Post
The Washington Post is Washington, D.C.'s largest newspaper and its oldest still-existing paper, founded in 1877. Located in the capital of the United States, The Post has a particular emphasis on national politics. D.C., Maryland, and Virginia editions are printed for daily circulation...
s Allison Stewart viewed its content as excessive, writing "Plastic Beach, long and synth-crazy and diffuse, can be a slog, a potentially great album suffering from an excess of everything." Entertainment Weekly
Entertainment Weekly
Entertainment Weekly is an American magazine, published by the Time division of Time Warner, that covers film, television, music, broadway theatre, books and popular culture...
s Leah Greenblatt viewed its "sonic drift" as "dull, and even dispiriting" in the album's second half, stating "In the end, Beach offers a vision of the future as digitised kitsch: groovy, yes, but lonely too". Jon Caramanica of The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
viewed its music as "thin and inconsequential, car-commercial electronic funk and tension-free hip-hop", while writing "It’s an appealing mess, moving at a fever pitch until swelling to something like an enthused climax. But still, a mess". Nick Annan of Clash
Clash (magazine)
Clash is a popular music and fashion magazine based in the United Kingdom. Its magazine title is published 12 times a year. It has a circulation of around 40,000....
gave it a 7/10 rating and stated "Of course, there’s a lot [sic] here to take in and maybe it just needs a fair few listens to fully digest it – the sign of any album worth its salt." The Guardian
The Guardian
The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
s Alexis Petridis commended Damon Albarn for his "kaleidoscopic musical ambition", and wrote "Not all of Plastic Beachs concoctions work... but there's something hugely impressive about Albarn's ability to coax artists out of their comfort zone."
Giving it 3 out of 4 stars, Chicago Tribune
Chicago Tribune
The Chicago Tribune is a major daily newspaper based in Chicago, Illinois, and the flagship publication of the Tribune Company. Formerly self-styled as the "World's Greatest Newspaper" , it remains the most read daily newspaper of the Chicago metropolitan area and the Great Lakes region and is...
writer Greg Kot
Greg Kot
Greg Kot is an American writer and journalist. Since 1990, Kot has been the music critic at the Chicago Tribune, where he has covered popular music and reported on music-related social, political and business issues...
viewed the album as "slightly less immediate" than previous Gorillaz albums, but praised Albarn's execution, writing "Albarn’s great talent is in bringing together seemingly mismatched elements from different cultures, genres and generations and creating something wonderful". Despite writing that it "runs out of steam toward the end", The A.V. Club
The A.V. Club
The A.V. Club is an entertainment newspaper and website published by The Onion. Its features include reviews of new films, music, television, books, games and DVDs, as well as interviews and other regular offerings examining both new and classic media and other elements of pop culture. Unlike its...
s Noel Murray gave Plastic Beach a B+ rating and perceived it as a "more urgent and less fiddly" improvement over its predecessors. Uncut
UNCUT (magazine)
Uncut magazine, trademarked as UNCUT, is a monthly publication based in London. It is available across the English-speaking world, and focuses on music, but also includes film and books sections...
gave it 4 out of 5 stars and called it "a brilliant concept album, full of perfect pop singles." NME
NME
The New Musical Express is a popular music publication in the United Kingdom, published weekly since March 1952. It started as a music newspaper, and gradually moved toward a magazine format during the 1980s, changing from newsprint in 1998. It was the first British paper to include a singles...
gave Plastic Beach a 7/10 rating and stated "So what is Gorillaz at the start of a new decade? [...] What it definitely still is, though, is good music." In a generally positive review, Miles Marshall Lewis
Miles Marshall Lewis
Miles Marshall Lewis is an American pop culture critic, essayist, literary editor, fiction writer, and music journalist. He is a graduate of Morehouse College, class of 1993....
of The Village Voice
The Village Voice
The Village Voice is a free weekly newspaper and news and features website in New York City that features investigative articles, analysis of current affairs and culture, arts and music coverage, and events listings for New York City...
wrote favourably of its "guest stars and gravitas", calling the album "by turns atmospheric ('Glitter Freeze'), capricious ('Pirate Jet'), and electronically funky ('Rhinestone Eyes')". Despite writing that it "isn't an artistic triumph or grand satirical gesture", PopMatters
PopMatters
PopMatters is an international webzine of cultural criticism that covers many aspects of popular culture. PopMatters publishes reviews, interviews, and detailed essays on most cultural products and expressions in areas such as music, television, films, books, video games, comics, sports, theater,...
writer Michael Kabran gave the album a 7/10 rating and called it "an enjoyable ride and is the best place to start if you just want a taste of Albarn’s post-Blur musical prowess and Hewlett’s animation wizardry". Spin
Spin (magazine)
Spin is a music magazine founded in 1985 by publisher Bob Guccione Jr.-History:In its early years, the magazine was noted for its broad music coverage with an emphasis on college-oriented rock music and on the ongoing emergence of hip-hop. The magazine was eclectic and bold, if sometimes haphazard...
s Jon Dolan called it "a jumble" and commended Albarn for his production. In a rave review of the album, Huw Jones of Slant Magazine
Slant Magazine
Slant Magazine is an online publication that features reviews of movies, music, TV, DVDs, theater, and video games, as well as interviews with actors, directors, and musicians. The site covers various film festivals like the New York Film Festival.- History :...
praised Albarn's musicianship and wrote "Plastic Beach provides the almighty shakeup that pop music has needed for some time". Pete Paphides of The Times
The Times
The Times is a British daily national newspaper, first published in London in 1785 under the title The Daily Universal Register . The Times and its sister paper The Sunday Times are published by Times Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary since 1981 of News International...
stated "this concept group has delivered its most fully realised concept album".
Pitchfork Media
Pitchfork Media
Pitchfork Media, usually known simply as Pitchfork or P4k, is a Chicago-based daily Internet publication established in 1995 that is devoted to music criticism and commentary, music news, and artist interviews. Its focus is on underground and independent music, especially indie rock...
placed it at number 35 on its list "The Top 50 Albums of 2010".
Track listing
Gorillaz
- 2D2D (Gorillaz)The fictional character Stuart Pot , better known by his stage name 2-D, also simply spelled as 2D, is a member of the British virtual band Gorillaz...
– lead vocals, keyboards, synthesisers, additional guitars, backing vocals - Murdoc Niccals – bass guitars, synth bass, drum machineDrum machineA drum machine is an electronic musical instrument designed to imitate the sound of drums or other percussion instruments. They are used in a variety of musical genres, not just purely electronic music...
- Cyborg Noodle – guitars, synth guitars, additional keys and synths
Musicians
- Bashy – vocals on track 3
- David Coulter – additional Jews harp
- Jason Cox – engineer
- De La Soul – vocals on track 6
- Mos Def – vocals on tracks 5 and 12
- Gorillaz – producer
- Jamie Hewlett – artwork
- Hypnotic Brass Ensemble – additional brass on tracks 2 and 12, track 11 (live)
- Mick Jones – additional guitar on track 13
- The Lebanese National Orchestra for Oriental Arabic Music – orchestra on track 3
- Kano – vocals on track 3
- Yukimi Nagano – vocals on tracks 7 and 14
- The Purple, The People, The Plastic Eating People – choir
- Essam Rafea – conductor
- Lou Reed – vocals on track 9
- Gruff Rhys – vocals on track 6
- Andre de Ridder – conductor
- Paul Simonon – additional bass on track 13
- sinfonia ViVA – orchestra on tracks 1, 15, 17 and 18
- Mark E. Smith – vocals on track 8
- Snoop Dogg – vocals on track 2
- Stephen Sedgwick – programming
- Simon TongSimon TongSimon Tong is a guitarist and keyboardist who was a member of The Verve between 1996 and 1999 and is currently a member of Erland and the Carnival and Transmission. He has also played on tour with Blur, Gorillaz and the unnamed supergroup responsible for The Good, the Bad & the Queen...
– additional guitars - Gabriel Manuals Wallace – additional drums
- Fredrik Wallin – additional keyboards on tracks 7 and 14
- Howie Weinberg – mastering
- Hakan Wirenstrand – additional keyboards on tracks 7 and 14
- Bobby Womack – vocals on tracks 5 and 15
- Zombie Flesh Eaters – design
Chart positions
| Chart (2010) | Peak position |
|---|---|
| Australian Albums Chart ARIA Charts The ARIA charts are the main Australian music sales charts, issued weekly by the Australian Recording Industry Association. The charts are a record of the highest selling singles and albums in various genres in Australia. ARIA commenced compiling its own charts in-house from the week ending 26 June... |
1 |
| Austrian Albums Chart | 1 |
| Belgian Albums Chart Ultratop 50 Ultratop 50 singles, often just Ultratop 50, is the weekly chart of fifty best-selling singles in Flanders, Belgium, and is produced and published by the Ultratop organization. The chart has existed since March 31, 1995... |
1 |
| Canadian Albums Chart Canadian Albums Chart The Canadian Albums Chart is the official album sales chart in Canada. It is compiled every Wednesday by U.S.-based music sales tracking company Nielsen Soundscan, and published every Thursday by Jam! Canoe and Billboard, along with its sister charts the Canadian Singles Chart and the Canadian BDS... |
3 |
| Czech Republic Albums Chart | 6 |
| Danish Albums Chart | 1 |
| French Albums Chart Syndicat National de l'Edition Phonographique The Syndicat national de l'édition phonographique is the inter-professional organization which protects the interests of the French record industry... |
2 |
| German Albums Chart | 3 |
| Icelandic Albums Chart | 4 |
| Irish Albums Chart Irish Albums Chart The Irish Albums Chart is the Irish music industry standard albums popularity chart issued weekly by the Irish Recorded Music Association and compiled on its behalf by Chart-Track. Chart rankings are based on sales, which are compiled through over-the-counter retail data captured electronically... |
4 |
| Italian Albums Chart Federation of the Italian Music Industry The Federation of the Italian Music Industry is an umbrella organization that keeps track of virtually all aspects of the music recording industry in Italy.... |
12 |
| Chart (2010) | Peak position |
|---|---|
| Mexican Albums Chart AMPROFON Asociación Mexicana de Productores de Fonogramas y Videogramas is a non-profit organization integrated by multinational and national record companies in Mexico. Established on April 3, 1963, it groups phonographic companies that represent more than 70 percent of the market in Mexico... |
10 |
| Dutch Albums Chart MegaCharts MegaCharts is responsible for the composition and exploitation of a broad collection of official charts in the Netherlands, of which the Mega Top 50 and the Mega Album Top 100 are the most known ones. Mega Charts also provides information to the Stichting Nederlandse Top 40, of which the Dutch Top... |
8 |
| New Zealand Albums Chart Recording Industry Association of New Zealand The Recording Industry Association of New Zealand is a non-profit trade association of record producers, distributors and recording artists who sell music in New Zealand... |
4 |
| Norwegian Albums Chart VG-lista VG-listen is a Norwegian record chart. It is weekly presented in the newspaper VG and the Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation program Topp 20. It is considered the primary Norwegian record chart, charting albums and singles from countries and continent around the world. The data is collected by... |
6 |
| Polish Albums Chart Polish Music Charts The Polish Music Charts are two official album charts and seven singles charts in Poland, provided by ZPAV, the Polish Society of the Phonographic Industry . The first, the Top 100, is a monthly chart based on data received from the album companies... |
7 |
| Portuguese Albums Chart | 4 |
| Spanish Albums Chart | 24 |
| Swedish Albums Chart Sverigetopplistan Sverigetopplistan, earlier known as Topplistan and Hitlistan and other names, is since October 2007 the Swedish national record chart, based on sales data from Swedish Recording Industry Association .... |
10 |
| Swiss Albums Chart Swiss Music Charts The Swiss Music Charts are Switzerland's main music sales charts. The charts are a record of the highest-selling singles and albums in various genres in Switzerland.The Swiss Charts include:* Singles Top 75... |
2 |
| UK Albums Chart UK Albums Chart The UK Albums Chart is a list of albums ranked by physical and digital sales in the United Kingdom. It is compiled every week by The Official Charts Company and broadcast on a Sunday on BBC Radio 1 , and published in Music Week magazine and on the OCC website .To qualify for the UK albums chart... |
2 |
| US Billboard 200 Billboard 200 The Billboard 200 is a ranking of the 200 highest-selling music albums and EPs in the United States, published weekly by Billboard magazine. It is frequently used to convey the popularity of an artist or groups of artists... |
2 |
| Brazilian Albums Chart | 2 |
End of year charts
| Chart (2010) | Rank |
|---|---|
| European Top 100 Albums European Top 100 Albums The European Top 100 Albums chart is the European adaptation of the Billboard 200 albums chart. It was created in March 1984.The European Top 100 Albums, commonly referred to as Eurochart Top 100 Albums shows the sales of an act in 19 European countries based on IFPI data.The European Top 100... |
30 |
| UK Albums Chart | 40 |
| US Billboard 200 Billboard 200 The Billboard 200 is a ranking of the 200 highest-selling music albums and EPs in the United States, published weekly by Billboard magazine. It is frequently used to convey the popularity of an artist or groups of artists... |
89 |
Certifications
Chart precession and succession
Release history
| Release dates | |
|---|---|
| Date | Country |
| 3 March 2010 | Japan |
| 5 March 2010 | Australia |
| Germany | |
| Ireland | |
| 8 March 2010 | New Zealand |
| Norway | |
| Sweden | |
| Denmark | |
| France | |
| United Kingdom | |
| 9 March 2010 | South Africa |
| Canada | |
| United States | |
| Mexico | |
| 11 March 2010 | South Korea |
| 12 March 2010 | Brazil |
"Plastic Beach" was released in a total of five editions, many of which contain a multitude of exclusive features. These are shown below:
| Standard Edition | "Experience Edition" | Japanese Standard Edition | Japanese "Experience Edition" | iTunes ITunes iTunes is a media player computer program, used for playing, downloading, and organizing digital music and video files on desktop computers. It can also manage contents on iPod, iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad.... Deluxe Version |
|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Standard 16 tracks | |||||
| Bonus track: Pirate's Progress | |||||
| Bonus track: Three Hearts, Seven Seas, Twelve Moons | |||||
| Stickers & Poster | |||||
| "Making of Plastic Beach" DVD | |||||
| Access to exclusive online content | |||||
| Lyrics | |||||
| Notebook | |||||
| Stylo Stylo (song) "Stylo" is the first single from British alternative group Gorillaz's third studio album Plastic Beach. The song features guest vocals from Bobby Womack and Mos Def. The single was released on 26 January 2010.-Production:... music video |
|||||
| Access to iTunes LP ITunes LP iTunes LP is a format for interactive album artwork introduced by Apple Inc. on the 9 September 2009. It is similar to the CMX format being developed by the 4 major record labels, and operates within the iTunes 9 software, allowing the user to view multimedia elements alongside the music... Features |
|||||
| T-shirt T-shirt A T-shirt is a style of shirt. A T-shirt is buttonless and collarless, with short sleeves and frequently a round neck line.... The T-shirt offered varies depending on the edition. |