Ethan Clarke
Plastic Beach is the name of the third studio album by the British virtual band Gorillaz, released on 3 March 2010. The album features 16 songs and collaborations with several artists, including Snoop Dogg, Hypnotic Brass Ensemble, Kano, Bashy, Bobby Womack, Mos Def, and Mick Jones. The title track, Plastic Beach, features Mick Jones and Paul Simonon and addresses pollution and the rise of cyberculture. The song conveys the idea of the trends we are currently going through, with lyrics such as It's a Casio on a plastic beach, it's a styrofoam deep-sea landfill. Damon Albarn, co-creator of Gorillaz, described the album as a collection of social realism parallel with love.
| Characteristics | Values |
|---|---|
| Album | Plastic Beach |
| Album release date | 3 March 2010 |
| Track | Plastic Beach |
| Track number | 13 |
| Featured artists | Mick Jones, Paul Simonon |
| Producers | Damon Albarn |
| Lyrics | To the dark, dark seas / Comes the only whale / Watching ships go by / It's the day we try / It doesn't know / It's a Casio on a plastic beach, it's a Casio on a plastic beach / It's styrofoam deep sea landfill, it's a styrofoam deep sea landfill / It's automated computer speech, it's automated computer speech / It's a Casio on a plastic beach, it's a Casio / Did they haul you out / On a really hot day? / When the call got made / You had gone away / From us / It's a Casio on a plastic beach, it's a Casio on a plastic beach / It's styrofoam deep sea landfill, it's a styrofoam deep sea landfill / It's automated computer speech, it's automated computer speech / It's a Casio on a plastic beach, it's a Casio / Plastico, plastico, plastico where the green, green grows / Plastico, plastico, plastico where the green, green grows / Plastico, plastico, plastico where the green, green grows / Plastico, plastico, plastico |
| Themes | Social realism, love, pollution, cyberculture |
| Related songs | "Empire Ants", "Superfast Jellyfish", "Sweepstakes", "Broken", "On Melancholy Hill", "Rhinestone Eyes", "Stylo", "Do Ya Thing", "Clouds of Unknowing" |
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What You'll Learn
Plastic Beach features many collaborations
Plastic Beach, the third studio album by the British virtual band Gorillaz, features many collaborations with other artists. The album was released on 3 March 2010 by Parlophone internationally and by Virgin Records in the United States.
Plastic Beach was created by Gorillaz co-founders Damon Albarn and Jamie Hewlett, who initially conceived it as an unfinished project called Carousel in late 2007. Albarn chose to self-produce Plastic Beach, recording from June 2008 to November 2009 in various locations, including London, New York City, and Damascus.
The album features a larger roster of guest artists compared to previous Gorillaz albums. These collaborations include Snoop Dogg, Hypnotic Brass Ensemble, Kano, Bashy, Bobby Womack, Mos Def, Gruff Rhys, De La Soul, Little Dragon, Mark E. Smith, Lou Reed, Mick Jones, Paul Simonon, sinfonia Viva, and the Syrian National Orchestra for Arabic Music.
Albarn's desire to work with an "eclectic and surprising" group of people resulted in a diverse range of collaborators, spanning from hip-hop giants like Snoop Dogg and Mos Def to Swedish electronica band Little Dragon, and rock legend Lou Reed. Bobby Womack, who initially knew nothing about Gorillaz, was convinced to join the collaboration by his daughter, a fan of the band.
Plastic Beach combines experimental cross-genre musical elements with an underlying environmentalist theme, presenting the titular Plastic Beach as a "secret island" formed from all the plastic thrown into the ocean. The album explores the monotony of working life, the potential end of Plastic Beach, and the melancholy of consumerism and disposability.
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Stylo was recorded in one take
"Stylo" is the first single from the British virtual band Gorillaz's third studio album, Plastic Beach. The song was released on 26 January 2010 and features guest vocals from Bobby Womack and Mos Def. Womack, who initially knew nothing about Gorillaz, was told to sing whatever was on his mind during the recording of "Stylo". Womack, a diabetic, started to pass out after an hour of recording and had to be given a banana. Womack later said: "They said, 'No, we got it on tape.' I know it must have freaked them out because it freaked me out".
"Stylo" was met with mainly positive reviews and was one of the key points of the album. The song reached number 78 on the Triple J Hottest 100 in 2010 and was the first Gorillaz song to reach any Japanese chart, peaking at number eight on the Japan Hot 100. It was also a success in Mexico, reaching number 7 on the Ingles Airplay chart. The music video for "Stylo" premiered on the Gorillaz YouTube channel on 26 January 2010, the same day as the song's release. The video was directed by Jamie Hewlett and Pete Candeland and was produced by Zombie Flesh Eaters, with animation by Passion Pictures and live action by HSI Productions.
"Stylo" was performed live throughout the Escape to Plastic Beach world tour, with Bobby Womack and Mos Def joining the band on tour. The song's working title was "Binge". Reggae singer Eddy Grant claimed that "Stylo" bore similarities to his 1983 song "Time Warp", alleging that Gorillaz had infringed the copyright of his song. Despite the allegations, no news of a lawsuit has been made public.
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Rhinestone Eyes samples Electric Shock
"Rhinestone Eyes" is a song from the Gorillaz album Plastic Beach. "Rhinestone Eyes" samples "Electric Shock", an unreleased song from the same album.
"Electric Shock" is one of the most well-known unreleased Gorillaz tracks. It was performed only once, in London on October 22, 2008, by Damon Albarn alongside the group Africa Express. The song was initially meant to include De La Soul and was also said to have featured Mos Def at some point.
On January 14, 2010, Albarn appeared on BBC Radio 1 and premiered demos of three new Gorillaz songs: "Electric Shock", "Broken", and "Stylo". "Electric Shock" did not make it onto the Plastic Beach album, but samples of the song were used in "Rhinestone Eyes", as well as the intro orchestral separated into the bonus track "Three Hearts, Seven Seas, Twelve Moons".
The lyrics of "Electric Shock" include the repeated line "That's electric shock", accompanied by bass. The song also includes keyboards, which can be heard in the Humanz cut "Strobelite".
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Plastic Beach addresses pollution
Plastic Beach is the title of the third studio album by the British virtual band Gorillaz, released on 3 March 2010. The album was produced primarily by Damon Albarn, who also co-created Gorillaz.
The idea for the album came to Albarn while he was on a beach near his house: "I was just looking for all the plastic within the sand", he said. In a Plastic Beach documentary, Albarn stated that the album title doesn't have to be narrative-driven. He interpreted the island as a collection of plastic and other waste in the ocean, now clean because it's all been collected into an island.
The lyrics and themes of the album Plastic Beach address pollution, specifically the global issue of plastic pollution. The song "Plastic Beach", featuring Mick Jones and Paul Simonon, includes the lyrics: "It's a casio on a plastic beach [...] It's styrofoam deep sea landfill". In September 2008, Albarn said he wanted to work with an eclectic group of people, and the album features collaborations with several artists.
Plastic pollution is a pressing environmental issue, with plastic accumulating in oceans and on beaches worldwide. It has become a global crisis, with billions of pounds of plastic making up about 40% of the world's ocean surfaces. Plastic pollution has a detrimental and deadly impact on wildlife, as thousands of marine animals, including endangered species, are killed each year due to ingesting plastic or getting entangled in it. Sea turtles, for example, can mistake floating plastic garbage for food, leading to choking, internal injuries, or starvation.
Beach clean-ups are one way to address plastic pollution and raise awareness about the issue. These efforts help to reduce the amount of plastic waste on beaches and in the ocean, while also educating people about the importance of proper waste disposal.
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Empire Ants and Superfast Jellyfish are fan favourites
"Empire Ants" and "Superfast Jellyfish" are fan favourites from the Gorillaz' third studio album, Plastic Beach. "Empire Ants" features guest vocals and instrumentation from Yukimi Nagano, the vocalist of the trip-hop band Little Dragon. Damon Albarn, the Gorillaz frontman, was first introduced to Little Dragon through his partner, Suzi Winstanley, a fan of the band. Yukimi Nagano, on the other hand, had not heard of Gorillaz before the collaboration. BBC Music described "Empire Ants" as "a trickling ballad to rank alongside Blur's best", while Pitchfork characterised Little Dragon's contributions to Plastic Beach as "airy, elusive, and amazingly beautiful".
"Superfast Jellyfish" was inspired by Murdoc Niccals' wandering on Plastic Beach, where he noticed around 20,000 leaflets advertising the 'Superfast Jellyfish' fast-food chain washed up on the shore. The lyrics were based on the information on the back of the leaflets, describing the fictional food as "the fastest food known to man". The music video for "Superfast Jellyfish" features a man cooking the jellyfish in a microwave and then being entranced by their dance. The song was initially featured in the iTunes LP edition of Plastic Beach and later uploaded to the band's YouTube channel.
Plastic Beach, as a whole, features an eclectic range of collaborations, including artists like Snoop Dogg, Hypnotic Brass Ensemble, Kano, Bashy, Bobby Womack, Mos Def, Gruff Rhys, De La Soul, Little Dragon, Mark E. Smith, Lou Reed, Mick Jones, Paul Simonon, sinfonia Viva, and the Syrian National Orchestra for Arabic Music. Damon Albarn, the creative force behind the album, aimed to connect pop sensibility with an underlying message about the environmental impact of plastic pollution.
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Frequently asked questions
The album features 16 songs, including Stylo, Sweepstakes, Rhinestone Eyes, On Melancholy Hill, Empire Ants, Superfast Jellyfish, Broken, Electric Shock, Plastic Beach, Do Ya Thing, and Clouds of Unknowing.
'Plastic Beach' features Mick Jones and Paul Simonon.
The song addresses pollution and the rise of cyberculture.
