An email over the weekend from Mark Golley, who's gone over to the States to catch a few dates on the solo tour Neil Young's doing with Bert Jansch in support. It's really interesting stuff about Young's latest capricious and intriguing career swerve - "performance and spook in equal measure" - so I figured that, with Mark's permission, I'd reprint it here.
What would Murdoc make of it? Previously, Gorillaz live performances have seen the “real” musicians play anonymously behind a curtain. But not tonight. If anything, tonight’s show abandons the notion of Gorillaz as a “virtual band” altogether. It seems more about establishing Damon Albarn’s overdue re-emergence as a front man, after spending close to a decade in the background on a number of collaborative projects, from Mali Music to The Good, The Bad And The Queen and Gorillaz.
Slightly shorter playlist than usual this week, since I finally downloaded and began investigating the six and a half hours of astounding music that make up the “Honest Strings” Jack Rose tribute. Can’t recommend that one enough: I have a vague plan to write much more about it for my next column in the mag version of Uncut.
