Gorillaz Ponder Two 'Plastic Beach' Sequels

Posted on Apr 27th 2010 3:00PM by Mike Ayers
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While Gorillaz fans are enjoying the 16 new tracks on the group's third album, 'Plastic Beach,' mastermind Damon Albarn tells Spinner that he recorded enough during the sessions that could theoretically yield two 'Plastic Beach' sequels.

"I recorded an awful lot of music for this record, about 80 pieces of music in total," Albarns says. "So, theoretically there is a part two and part three of 'Plastic Beach' if we ever felt motivated to spend another few years finishing it. But because it's so eclectic, it takes a long time to actually get a picture because we don't start with a picture or an idea. We start with a very loose idea of 'Plastic Beach,' which you know probably means something different to me than it does to [artist] Jamie [Hewlett], but we evolve."

While Albarn concedes that the nature of Gorillaz is very whimsical in that nothing is ever premeditated, their recent headlining set at Coachella could be an indication that we'll get more Gorillaz output in the near future. "It's not just a studio band because it can work in front of 80,000 people," Albarn explains "But it's not a rock band, which is essentially traditionally how you communicate, but it has elements of rock in it. It's not hip-hop, but it has very strong hip-hop roots."

"It's this third album that we've finally figured out how to do it properly," Hewlett adds. "The second album, 'Demon Days,' those shows at the Apollo were great. But the first album, we didn't know what we were doing. That's how we do it now, definitely."

"It felt like in our evolution, [Coachella] was an epiphany," Albarn says. "In a way, what's on this record has only touched or scratched the surface of the period of work and the sort of adventures that we went on. It's some really out-there stuff, which hopefully will see the light of day at some point. This was as pop as I could make out of everything I had."

'Plastic Beach' is out now on Virgin Records.