Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
Well, as resources inevitably disappear [in Africa], people have to make do with a lot less. You have to be much more ingenious with a lot less, and accept that you can't get your perfect tuna sandwich on a street corner.
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
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.
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.
A lot of Gorillaz songs were very personal. I mean, that's why it was interesting, because it wasn't music being made for a cartoon. It was something different. It was a much more emotional affair. I wasn't necessarily thinking in the third-person then.
It always struck me that Africa was, in a strange way, a futuristic place and had elements and vibes and spirits that were going to inform the future. Africa Express is an attempt to engage that power outside Africa, and for everyone to benefit from it.
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
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.
It's important that Oasis are rude about everybody and that they get drunk...Fair enough. It's nice, isn't it? But it's nothing to do with me. They came to see us in Manchester and they were very pleasant boys. Very nice. I'd like to see that as a quote. Oasis are very nice boys.
I like to go to Africa purely with something to do. I'm not very comfortable getting into an armor-plated Land Rover and going to see things, with my hand gel, you know, it's not me at all. So I like to hang out and you know, really get to know people and try and do something that resonates with them.
I spent two years figuring out how I could turn it into something that would satisfy me as a musician but also make some kind of cross-cultural link. I feel that I kind of at least touched on the possibilities of cross-cultural music, but it is a lifetime's work, and I don't profess to be anything other than a novice at it.
I'm slightly ambivalent to the whole relationship between the whole advertising world and music. I think sometimes it works and sometimes it's a really bad mismatch. I think on this occasion its fine because the iPod is like your own mini-library and that can't be a bad thing. It promotes eclecticism and that's very much what we are about so it's a good relationship.
I like to put my iPad on the window and leave it there for however long the journey is, so that I'm staring out, and it's staring out. We're kind of staring out together. It's very poetic to me, watching that absent-minded passing of time. You realize how much you've taken in. What is left of that memory of you staring out of the window for an hour? It's all on the iPad.
I'm an English songwriter/composer, working in Mandarin and trying to find something about Chinese culture that I really relate to and respect and feel some genuine emotions for - and it's quite hard, the pentatonic scale, and that, in a way, is why I think it works. Because I'm forced to limit myself to quite strict rules about what I did. Maybe that's how I avoided pastiche.
Each individual has their own opinions about whether war is an answer to any problems. Personally I think it's a waste of time, but I think more importantly, that it's is an issue that we haven't had any say in. That's why I feel so strongly about it. I don't feel like we've really been given any choice in this matter. I think if you had a referendum tomorrow, Tony Blair would have no choice but to call off the war.