Review-a-palooza #5:

Gorillaz - Plastic Beach

Damon Albarn has returned with co-creator Jaime Hewlett to fictional music super group Gorillaz for a spectacular third album that builds on the two previous outings. I feel slightly embarrassed writing about anything Albarn’s done. In my wild and misspent youth in the barren prairies of western Canada, I willfully wrote off Blur as ‘the group that wrote that woo-hoo song’ and never gave them a second glance until I was much older. Putting past indiscretions aside, this is one hell of a fine album.

Damon has grown in leaps and bounds as a composer and this album showcases his ability to create a cohesive sonic experience. A task made daunting with a mish mash of musical genres at play and a host of guest artists, each able to steal a song away. Some of the music giants that appear on the album are Snoop Dogg, Lou Reed, Stuff White People Like certified Mos Def, Paul Simonon and Mick Jones and a powerful and evocative Bobby Womack, who appears at the request of his daughter who assured the aging soul man that the Gorillaz are “cool”. As with previous Gorillaz albums this is a mix of Dub, Electro, Hip Hop and especially pop and Plastic Beach adds to this with Bollywood strings and some Chicago flavoured horns.

It’s hard to pick out tracks that stand out, as they are all pretty tight. Glitter Freeze featuring The Fall’s Mark E. Smith is great. Some Kind of Nature featuring Lou Reed is a great tonal piece, and it’s said that Lou Reed demanded no one be present during the recording. Being bashful maybe? Either way, the end result is phenomenal. The album really gets its legs on its third track; White Flag featuring London hip hop artists Kano, Bashy and the Lebanese National Orchestra for Oriental Arabic Music.

To me the only song that never really takes off is second off the top; Welcome to the World of the Plastic Beach with the lethargic rhymes of Snoop Dogg. After the weight and scope hinted at during the Orchestral Intro, Snoop and company don’t really reign in the scope that Plastic Beach achieves in latter tracks.

This is a near perfect album. The production, composition, they are all top notch. This is a clear front runner for every "Best of 2010" list out there.

Bands you should like #1:

The Happy Mondays

The Happy Mondays are one of the coolest bands to come out of Manchester. Period. And I'm talking about a town that produced The Smiths, Joy Division/New Order, The Stone Roses and on a lesser scale of cool, Oasis.

With the Stone Roses and Inspiral Carpets, The Happy Mondays were the forefathers of the Madchester scene, a never before seen mixture of dance and guitar based rock. The band formed in the 80’s and in their original incarnation, released four proper albums. Well, three proper albums and one that sunk them and their label into financial ruin.

The Mondays had a pedigree to them that most bands never achieve. They were signed to the hugely influential Factory Records. Their albums were produced by the industry’s finest: Martin Hannett, John Cale and Paul Oakenfold. Their lyrics were catchy and at times quite profound, this being particularly interesting due to the mental state of the mind producing them. Above all else, they had a magnetism that attracted equal parts critical acclaim and fan following.

The band’s history is like a modern day Robert Johnson, so much of it is owed to legend it can be difficult to distinguish the band from the myth. So, here are some of the best stories I’ve heard about the Mondays:

1. As it goes, the Mondays were discovered at a battle of the bands at Tony Wilson’s Hacienda nightclub and were signed regardless of placing last.

2. There’s also the time that singer Shaun Ryder and Bez fed bread laced with rat poison to countless pigeons that took to the air only to rain dead to the ground.

3. There’s also the going rumour that it was Happy Monday’s resident “dancer/percussionist/dealer” Bez that was responsible for introducing Ecstasy to the UK.

4. Or that the Monday’s were so hooked on heroin that they had to be flown to the heroin free Barbados to record their fourth album, only to become addicted to crack. And in order to support that habit they sold their recording gear and clothing.

5. And the last, too good to be untrue rumour that the Monday’s walked out of a record deal with London Records under the pretense of getting some KFC, never to return. It would be safe to assume that KFC was code for heroin and lots of it.

The Mondays broke up (for the first time) in the 90’s due to a cocktail of addiction and publics lack of love towards Madchester on the dawn of American Grunge. They’ve recently given it yet another go, with three of the original players back in action but, it’s not the same. Whatever magic they captured during Madchester is gone, and it is a bit queer seeing these old buggers try to tear it up.

I would suggest you give a listen to the bands first three albums: Squirrel and G-Man Twenty Four Hour Party People Plastic Face Carnt Smile (White Out), Bummed and Pills 'n' Thrills and Bellyaches for the best of the Mondays. These albums best exemplify what the bad was. For more Happy Monday action, check out the film 24 Hour Party People, the band plays a heavy, if not fictionalized role. Shaun Ryder even has a cameo as a drug dealer.

Here are some videos of the band: