There are artists who always liked to experiment and make different kinds of music like David Bowie, Peter Gabriel and David Byrne. The Blur vocalist and Gorillaz mastermind Damon Albarn is also that kind of musician and he is constantly changing his songwriting. But of course, there are artists and bands that can be on the same path for their entire career and Albarn believes The Rolling Stones are one of those.
In an interview with the French magazine Les Inrockuptibles he criticized the British group for repeating themselves and also gave his opinion on the official video for their single “Angry”, from their latest album “Hackney Diamonds”.
Damon Albarn criticizes the Rolling Stones
“This really annoyed me. Because my family lives in Hackney and the way they showed up at the Hackney Empire venue really pissed me off. They’ve never did a thing in Hackney, they’ve never played there, never contributed to anything. They just showed up. It’s all nonsense. And I listened to their new song and watched this horrible music video showing them at different stages of their lives on billboards. And this young woman objectified. What the hell is this? There’s something completely disconnected.”
He was then asked if he would see himself at the age of 80 capitalizing on his past glory. He replied saying: “There’s no chance and I’ll tell you why. I did all sorts of things, whereas they’ve never been anything other than the Rolling Stones. I love the idea of devoting your life to one thing, in search of the sublime. But the truth is, they’ve became worse. Worse at persisting to stay themselves. That’s something I don’t understand. Making exactly the same music but not that good. There must be no joy in doing something like this,” Damon Albarn said.
Damon was born in Whitechapel, London, England in 1968, when the Rolling Stones already existed for five years. His musical career started in 1988 but he really achieved fame in the 90s when Blur released praised studio albums that made them one of the most famous Brit Pop bands from that decade. In the late 90s he proved he could go even further in other musical directions after he created the “virtual band” Gorillaz alongside the artists Jamie Hewlett.