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Are the Gorillaz Postmodern?

So how can The Gorillaz help us to understand the concept of postmodernism? Postmodernism is at once both an aesthetic style...

...changes to our sense of identity...

...it describes the way society is increasingly characterised by consumerism, media saturation/technology, & globalisation...

it suggests that ‘absolute truths’ are non-existent, & questions the concept of ‘reality’.

In postmodern music, the cultural image surrounding the music, through film, music videos, music press and other media, is all that matters.

The Gorillaz are a collection of musicians, making music in a generically eclectic style, almost anonymously. But anonymity doesn’t sell. High Concept refers to the marketing of the band - something to put on the CD covers, posters, T-shirts and in music videos. The Gorillaz performed in sell-out shows, as ‘virtual personalities’. In theory, this separates the music from the far more saleable star persona BUT audiences became fans of fictional characters; the ‘high concept’ shifted their interest into the profitable realm of cult fandom.

Capitalism commodifies popular culture, packaging desirable social identities in purchasable pop acts; Albarn’s role in The Gorillaz reinforces their argument: he is lead vocalist, but not front man, identities which are usually one and the same.

So if ‘anything goes’ in the postmodern world, who’s to say what’s good and what’s bad?

Money. For the postmodernists, in the absence of any aesthetic criteria, profit becomes the criteria of worth.

cult fans are willing to illustrate their fandom, it’s spend money.

Albarn brought to The Gorillaz a fan base that has, as he has himself, matured from Britpop, Hewlett brought his own fanbase, from 90s’ cult comic strip and film, Tank Girl

Far from being original, The Gorillaz simply cut up the pieces of established styles and genres, to create something new, a technique known in postmodernism as ‘bricolage’.

Japanese animé informs Hewlett’s creations

The Gorillaz’ virtual identities appeals to audiences in a playful, pleasurable way. This problematising of identity and reality, along with the band’s eclectic mix of hip-hop, punk and dub reggae, are prime characteristics of postmodernism, according to Lyotard

Jameson

How do they reflect Cultural Recycling?

Nov 2007 Manchester Opera House - a setting known for high cultural theatrical performances

two choirs and a set of violinists and cellists; a total of 80 musicians. Rather than a traditional support act at a live gig, a big screen played a comical animation, and two life size puppets of Murdoc and 2D MC’d. The programme was made up of four prints of Hewlett’s artwork. This spectacle of popular music and performance drawn from an eclectic mix of genres and visual arts, blurred the boundaries between what we might understand as high culture and popular culture in the contemporary arts.

...conventionally, bands are notorious for fall outs, diva demands and drink or drug problems. Murdoc, for example, has been in prison for ripping off a Mexican whorehouse, Noodle is one of 23 children trained as part of an elite military team, and good natured front man 2D is constantly battling bullying from Murdoc...

In their music videos, The Gorillaz always appear as fully animated characters, conforming to all the conventions of the medium, including scenes where they are playing instruments and others where they are acting out a story.

Baudrillard

How do they define an absence of reality?

The ‘anything goes’ sensibility of postmodernism is certainly recognisable in The Gorillaz. Live artists perform alongside the animations...

Foucault

How do they reflect our obsession with Voyeurism in Postmodernity?

The artists collaborating with The Gorillaz, however, are often ‘disembodied’ - Shaun Ryder appears as a decapitated head in ‘Dare’. Such representations serve playfully to question the concept of realism, as the cartoons become more fully rounded characters than those depicted using photographic realism.

Do The Gorillaz really exist at all? We all know cartoons can’t play music. The Gorillaz conduct their own interviews. When they win awards, they accept with fully animated acceptance speeches. So surely the band does exist in their own right – how could a fictional band win ‘Best Group’ at the 2005 European MTV awards?

Lyotard

How do they reflect a world with no structure or fixed meaning?

The Gorillaz are arguably an expression of postmodern culture. They use the media & technology to critique the marketing practices of the music industry, whilst marketing themselves. How ironic.

...they illustrate how audiences enjoy the hybridity of cultural forms and genres,

...they pose questions around the nature of representation, performance and existence, as they play with modes and expressions of realism.

...respond to the fluidity of identity represented, accepting and adapting to the new relationships of fandom between artists and audiences...

...blur the boundaries of high and popular culture, by placing popular music in a high cultural context...

So are The Gorillaz Postmodern?

PO-MO

fORmz & KoNVenShunz

And one more thing...

PoMo sTyLE

is here

gLoBAlisAtIOn

A high concept band?

The superficiality of fandom & ‘image now, music later’. The Gorillaz’ slogan, Reject False Icons, appears to confront this trend; challenging the audience to care about the music, rather than the performer.

The band’s acceptance speech at the 2005 European MTV Awards showcased holographic technology offering audiences the spectacle of pioneering technology in the information age

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