Damon Albarn Quotes

1. The cartoon is a metaphor really for the fact that it's almost impossible in our celebrity obsessed culture to move around genres and sort of change you ideas, change your face, you know?  




2. When you're doing a deal with someone in the southern Sahara, it's a very different way of doing business than in London. You can't sign them in the usual way because they'd end up getting ripped off, which would defeat the object of setting up a label like this.

3. My mum's been having a go at me since I was a teenager about pulling my trousers up. And I have tried, I really did, to keep my trousers up and they always just… drop. Does anyone else have that problem? Am I not alone?


4. The Gorillaz cartoons seem more real to me than the actual people on TV. Because at least you know that there's some intelligence behind the cartoons, and there's a lot of work that's gone into it, so it can't all be just a lie.

5. Oasis are very nice boys.

6. You know, there are many alter egos and Gorillaz is a collective of alter egos, really. I think anyone who gets involved in it has to sort of accept that nothing is really as it seems.

7. My fantasy Glastonbury would be to be 18 again and to go with a girl that I've just met and that I was really, really into. Either that or go with my mates and meet a girl there. I certainly wouldn't want to go with any famous people. I'd just go and take loads of drugs and watch all my favorite bands. I'd drink, smoke spliff, drop an E and watch The Silver Apples. Er, this is the 18-year-old Damon, not me now talking, of course. 



8. The British like sex to be a naughty thing. I think it's because we have an asexual Queen.

9. It's a very romantic idea, to go on a cobbled-together trip on a train with an African diner and rehearsal rooms and sliding doors that allow for playing on to platforms, and people meeting and planning concerts for the evening and watching the English countryside pass by. It's a beautiful thing.

10. The things that make me happy most are my family and working.




11. As a musician usually music is your way out.

12. Brothers is a much better word. There are moments when we absolutely and utterly connect without even having to say anything and there are other times when we might as well be on other continents. Like now, for example.

13. My mum thinks I'm ultra-conservative in the way I dress. Hippy parents just don't understand why you want to wear a shirt and smart shoes.

14. I'm turning into a croaky old singer.

15. There's always been a hip-hop element to my trousers.

16. As soon as it sounds fine, I'm on to the next thing, man.

17. The whole period has taught me that I enjoy being part of an ensemble rather than just a front man. Don't get me wrong - I enjoy that too, but I get more enjoyment out of really listening to everyone.

18. (on getting older) I've swapped my youthful promiscuity for something a bit more middle aged.




19. And there are no stars and that you're never really sure who's doing what and what voice is what and, you know what I mean? It's supposed to be quite elusive.

20. No, every album is something like a snapshot. It only shows one moment in time. It shows what we feel and think right at that point in time, nothing more and nothing less.

21. I really try to avoid all photographs now, I don't know why, I was so into it when I was younger. But let's face it, if you're a good-looking young male with talent you're not going to get taken seriously. I do feel that looks are something you have to get over… It was a great day when I realized I didn't need to see myself any more. I knew who I was…
 

22. I've got people camping outside my place in Kensington. In sleeping bags. It's not that irritating, except we haven't got any curtains in the front room, so we can't walk round in the nude.

23. Being in Blur has allowed me to travel and hear the music that's being made all over the world.




24. I'm very sexy in the morning.

25. We've said nothing in any of our interviews - we're probably the only band in history to do that. Dave just says nothing. Alex says nothing in an Alex way. Graham says nothing in a very negative way. I say nothing in a roundabout way. We do it on purpose because there is very little to say; it's all about feeling. Our generation doesn't need a spokesman.

26. Even though I'm a Chelsea fan, there's no getting around Ryan Giggs' genius. For the fact that you can walk into any pub across the land and guarantee that there'll be a conversation about him taking place. The last time that happened was with George Best.

27. In the sixties people took acid to make the world weird. Now the world is weird, people take Prozac to make it normal. 




28. I am genuinely inspired by my mum.

29. Aww man…Aw, I'm so sweaty I can't play properly any more…And I have difficulties playing anyway, so this just makes it virtually impossible for me. I wanna do this song justice as well. 




30. I can't be bothered anymore about giving songs titles.

31. Have I ever punched anyone in the band? Oh yeah, all of them! I used to punch Alex a lot. He used to say really annoying things deliberately. I almost think he liked being punched.




32. Yes, I am a middle-class twat.

33. I couldn't fit in with the lads at school. I was the weirdo. Post-stroke-gay. I always got called gay.

34. (what will you be if you were not a singer?) A farmer My grandad and uncle were farmers.I used to spend my summers in Lincolnshire on the farm. I'd to get up at 5.30am, and sit on my grandad's tractor. I loved it.

35. I hope we can keep doing it this way - making music and art that are pure products of our influences while not really having to let the whole celebrity side of it get in the way. Then maybe more virtual bands will come out and do the same thing.

36. My guaranteed way of sending myself into deep depression is to read music trade papers and watch MTV.



37. I was always a workaholic, but I just didn't have any work.

38. (on 5 words to describe himself) Cheeky, confident, insecure, sharp, direct.




39. I've got a PhD in tits.

40. I was approached by Oxfam to go to Mali as their ambassador and get involved in their various initiatives out there. But I felt that was missing the point of using me, a musician.



41. There were reports in the papers of people breaking up their relationships, because one liked oasis and the other one liked blur…One woman left her husband because he put our CD in the microwave.

42. I'm more homosexual than Brett Anderson.


43. What do we stand for? So we don't lie down all the time!


44. I'm not really one of those people who believes that if you're a musician you can just leave that behind and start getting into politics.

45. I have to wear a new T-shirt every night. I throw them into the audience. One day I'm going to go around the world and reclaim all my T-shirts.

46. We'll always be friends now. I like the idea of seeing each other being really old and doddery.

47. I find computers to be sort of uncharted seas. And as soon as you set out on them, you're lost.

48. (when asked for any tips on songwriting by a budding young songwriter) Yeah, Write Songs. 

49. It's good to read a book and get a hard-on at the same time.

50. It was quite a relief not to win the Mercury prize, because people are going to start getting fed up with us for winning everything. It's good not to achieve every time and it's important to remain some kind of underdog because there's nothing worse than a big-head.

51. I love the whole atmosphere here. The other day I was walking past the cemetery and I could hear singing coming from inside. After a while I realized it was a West Indian family singing a spiritual song.The rhythm sounded so incongruous, yet amazing at the same time. That's what is so special about round here. It's such a rich of cultures and images.

52. I had a Black girlfriend when I was five.

53. I'm a mixed up person. I've got this real essex man vibe…I can't help it…I can't stand the idea of being a sad lonely bed-sit poet…I'd rather be perceived as loud and arrogant.

54. WE ONLY HAD THREE THINGS TO SAY IN OUR FIRST INTERVIEWS: WE'RE GREAT WE'RE NOT AN INDIE BAND AND DON'T JUDGE US NOW - JUDGE US IN FIVE YEARS' TIME. AT LEAST NOW WE'VE DONE SOMETHING THAT LIVES UP TO MY BIG MOUTH.




55. It's not easy for us to talk about girls. We're not very articulate on the subject. Sexual energy is too tiring for me.

56. It's weird because with guys it's not a long thing, it's more of a "let's be mates, let's get on stage and, woargh, nice one!" sort a thing. It's funny, I really love that. If that's as far as I ever get in communicating with people, that's great. I just like the idea of everyone cuddling each other.

57. I've only ever been in love with one person and that's Justine.

58. I've been self-destructive over the years. Anyone who's interested in me will have a rough idea that I've kept a lot of things quiet. I choose not to define my low points. 




59. More and more, cultural groups are cross-pollinating, and we're getting much more interesting art as a result.


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