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Damon Albarn

About this Artist

Damon Albarn is a singer, songwriter, producer and composer whose eclectic musical style and observational lyrics have made him one of the UK’s most influential and consistently interesting musicians.

The singer with Blur and Gorillaz, he is the recipient of six Brits, two Ivor Novello Awards and a Grammy Award.

Outside of Blur and Gorillaz, Albarn has a number of other releases, including Mali Music (2002), The Good The Bad and The Queen (2006), Monkey: Journey to the West (2007), Kinshasa One Two (2011), Rocket Juice & The Moon (2012), Dr Dee (2012), Africa Express Presents: Maison Des Jeunes (2013), Africa Express Presents: The Orchestra of Syrian Musicians (2016), Merrie Land (2018), Africa Express Presents: Egoli (2019), as well as his Mercury Award-nominated debut solo album Everyday Robots (2014).

Albarn’s first full-length opera composition, Monkey: Journey to the West premiered at Manchester International Festival in 2007. Created in collaboration with Jamie Hewlett and Chen Shi Zheng, Monkey was performed entirely in Mandarin and went on to show at the Royal Opera House, the Théâtre du Châtelet in Paris, and the Spoleto Festival in Charleston. His second opera Dr Dee, co-created with Rufus Norris, premiered at Manchester International Festival in 2011 to widespread critical acclaim ahead of a successful run at ENO’s London Coliseum. Wonder.land, a musical with music by Albarn and dircted by Rufus Norris, made its world premiere at MIF in July 2015. Le Vol du Boli, a new musical production in collaboration with director Abderrahmane Sissako, opened at Théatre du Châtelet, Paris last year.

Albarn is co-founder of record label Honest Jons and has also produced music for Gorillaz, Amadou & Mariam, written music for the film soundtracks to 101 Reykjavik, Ravenous and Broken, and co-wrote and co-produced Bobby Womack’s acclaimed album The Bravest Man In The Universe (2012).

The Nearer The Fountain, More Pure The Stream Flows, the new studio album from Damon Albarn, was released to critical acclaim by new label home Transgressive Records on 12th November 2021. Originally intended as an orchestral piece inspired by the landscapes of Iceland, this last year has seen Albarn return to the music in lockdown and develop the work to 11 tracks which further explore themes of fragility, loss, emergence and rebirth. The result is a panoramic collection of songs with Albarn as storyteller. The album title is taken from a John Clare poem Love and Memory.  

Albarn lives in London with his family.