Damon Albarn recently made an appearance on Boiler Room, the live music streaming and event platform which has showcased various artists for well over a decade. The Blur and Gorillaz mastermind performed songs from a new project titled The Nearer the Fountain, More Pure the Stream Flows, a project inspired by “the landscapes of Iceland.”
This latest collection takes elements of new age and baroque pop, in a style that is similar to the works of Sufjan Stevens. The stream shows Albarn performing on a keyboard in his home during the isolation (although it is backed by a recorded instrumental track), which is cut with various landscape images.
The Gorillaz have been hard at work this year, coming out with a string of releases for Song Machine Season One, multi-media project showcasing the animated characters from the band performing alongside the group’s real life collaborators. The singles released from the project include “Momentary Bliss” featuring slowthai and Slaves, “Désolé” featuring Diawara, “Aries” featuring Peter Hook and Georgia and “How Far?” featuring Tony Allen and Skepta. The latter single was posthumous release for Allen, a legendary Afrobeat drummer who passed away last month from a heart attack at the age of 79.
Albarn took some time last year to work on his collaborative world music project Africa Express, who released a single titled “Where Will This Lead Us To?” featuring Moonchild Sanelly, Radio 123 and Blue May last summer. His 1990s alternative rock band Blur also made their first surprise concert performance in four years last spring.
Photo Credit: Raymond Flotat
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