Gorillaz has to be one of the most universally known bands, and recently they released the album “The Mountain.” This album has 15 songs and a runtime of about 66 minutes, which is pretty lengthy but manageable. Along with the album, there was a hand-drawn animated short film that was set to “The Mountain,” “The Moon Cave” and “Sad God,” three of the songs off the album and in my opinion the best three.
I can’t call myself a Gorillaz fan, not because I don’t like them, but because I haven’t had the chance to listen to many of their songs. I don’t hear many of their songs on a daily basis, but it’s impossible not to know of them. With how many artists my friends have been shocked that I don’t really know–Gorillaz included–there’s been a lot to catch up on. I’m glad I can finally expose myself to their music and work my way backwards. But enough about me; let’s climb up this album.
The first song, appropriately titled “The Mountain,” is a nice and serene start to the album. It has four artists featured: Dennis Hopper, Ajay Prasanna, Anoushka Shankar and Amaan Ali Bangash. With a completely Middle Eastern sound, it starts with a flute and slowly adds on more and more instruments, all of which make the song more and more amazing. It’s practically lyric-less, but that doesn’t take away from its charm. The end has some vocals, but they’re not like bars or anything. The lines are like mumbles and spoken words kind of thrown at you, setting up the scene of the mountain. Beautiful and serene, where all good souls go to rest; it’s a nice setup for the rest of the songs that follow.
Next up is “The Moon Cave,” starting off with a great ambience of birds and rain, followed by a group of string instruments and some clear vocals. It features Asha Puthli, Bobby Womack, Dave Jolicoeur and Jalen Ngonda. Then the groove comes in, and man does it cook. The vocals have an overlay on them to make the voice seem like it’s coming from a radio, but they fit the song perfectly. It really keeps up the vibe and is a nice chill song, but then it hits you with another groove switch by adding drums and more minimal background instruments. It just ramps the song up even more with a few changes in the tempo, but it still works as one coherent song.
To follow, there’s “The Happy Dictator,” which was released as a single a while back. Funnily enough, this is one song I found myself listening to often when it first came out and I remembered I hadn’t listened to much Gorillaz and needed to hop onto their music. This picks up the pace of the album a little bit, but still keeps the same vibe and amazing sound that the start of the album established.
And then there’s “The Hardest Thing” featuring Tony Allen. It starts off slow and uplifting and it ends with this rising trumpet sound that leads directly into the next song. I think of it like a transition piece, but it brings back the techno kind of vibe with some lyrics.
This song kind of directly transitions over to the next, “Orange County” featuring Bizarrap, Kara Jackson and Anoushka Shankar. This brings a happy, go-lucky sound to the album with some whistling in the background and a pumped-up vibe. It’s a nice song to pick up the pace a little bit.
Afterwards, “The God of Lying” brings back a swingish beat and immediate vocals from IDLES. It’s heavier, but still a jam. It reminds me of “Feel Good Inc.” in the slightest way through the beat and the transitions between the two voices. I found myself waiting for the Middle Eastern and empowering songs from the beginning of the album while listening.
My hopes were immediately fulfilled with the next song, “The Empty Dream Machine,” which brought back a chill beat but with the fulfilling lyrics I was looking forward to. It features Johnny Marr, Black Thought and Anousha Shanker. I was still left waiting for the amazing instrumentals to come back in full capacity, but this did have a pinch of what I was looking for. The rapping in this song was really good, too.
“The Manifesto” follows, bringing back the instrumentals I missed, plus some cheery vocals. It features Trueno and Proof, who both do really well in the song. It’s a long song, starting off with what you would expect of Gorillaz, but then it transitions into a much more traditional bass-heavy rap-sounding beat with a little of the trumpets heard somewhere earlier in the album in the background. The Gorillaz vocals come back after a few rap verses, ending the song with a really nice sound.
Next up is “The Plastic Guru,” featuring Anoushka Shankar and Johnny Marr. It brings back the sound similar to “The Hardest Thing” or “Orange County,” which was good to hear. It lightened the album back up from the bass-boosted songs and rap, which I think was needed. It’s probably one of the more forgettable songs on the album, but still a good listen.
After that comes “Delirium,” a song with an epic backing vocals intro that is eventually paired with a drum set for a while. At one point, the background gets some tech sound to pick up the pace between the choruses. It features Mark E. Smith, whose vocals sound good and who added a great deal to the message of the song itself.
“Damascus” comes up next with a heavy, electronic-sounding beat still featuring a Middle Eastern vibe with the vocalists featured: Omar Souleyman and Yasiin Bey. It’s an interesting song and well-made, but not something I could see myself listening to often. You kind of forget it’s a Gorillaz song, as his vocals are not featured often on this song.
My expectations were raised with the following track, “The Shadowy Light,” bringing back a swingish beat that reminds me of songs earlier in the album before the tracks all kind of melded together. It features Asha Bhosle, Gruff Rhys, Ajay Prasanna and Amaan Ali Bangash. They all blend together to make a really nice and peaceful song to bring us back to the mountain.
With my hopes high, the next song “Casablanca” featuring Johnny Marr and Paul Simonon keeps the pace slow with a more casual sound that’s almost natural to swing back and forth to. It’s nice to go back to the stretching tones I know Gorillaz to usually have in their songs.
Then we go back to what I was waiting for–the original sound I fell in love with in the song “The Sweet Prince,” featuring Ajay Prasanna, Anoushka Shankar and Johnny Marr. It’s a really nice song with a very peaceful backing track that reminds me why I liked this album in the first place. It really brought me back to the serenity the beginning of the album provided, and that continues into the last song, “Sad God” featuring Ajay Prasanna, Anoushka Prasanna and Black Thought.
This was a really nice way to end the album with a combination of the rapping and the peaceful vibe from the beginning of the album, like “The Sweet Prince.” This is probably one of my favorites on the album, and honestly made me fall in love with it all over again.
Something that carries through this album is that there are songs that have the perfect marching tempo–like you’re climbing up the mountain–and there are songs that are in between, as if you’re resting. For example, “The Manifesto” and “The Mountain” have really good walking tempos, while “The Hardest Thing” and “The Shadowy Light” are like the breathers.
The only thing I have to say is that a middle chunk of this album kind of loses this charm, and I wish it didn’t. I still like this album, but mostly because of the few songs with that serene sound. This definitely makes me want to listen to some of their earlier albums.
Hayley Doda can be contacted at
