Melody-Makers

The story behind one new Gorillaz song, featuring multiple collaborators and two “upper-echelon old farts.” 

- Lane Brown

IT’S BEEN SEVEN years since the virtual hip-hop band Gorillaz last released an album, which isn’t that long considering the labor that goes into one. Their latest record, Humanz, is meant to seem like the work of four cartoon characters, but the business of actually making it fell to Damon Albarn, the sometime Blur front man who produces the music and wrangles the guest vocalists, and Jamie Hewlett, the illustrator who draws the characters and creates visuals for each song. For “We Got the Power,” the upbeat anthem that closes Humanz, they enlisted Jehnny Beth of the band Savages; rapper singer D.R.A.M.; and, most notably, Albarn’s former nemesis, Noel Gallagher of Oasis.

THE SONG

DAMON ALBARN: It started on March 23 of 2016 when I was given a Casio MT-40 keyboard on my birthday. I’ve got hundreds of keyboards, but I was particularly excited about this one because it has the same sound as those very classic ’80s reggae tunes. I made a demo, and came up with the line “We got the power to be loving each other.” I’d always promised Noel Gallagher he could be on this record. I thought it might be cute, the idea of us singing about the power to love each other. Of course, no one’s asked Liam Gallagher what he thinks about the song yet. No doubt he’d have a fantastic one-liner about what a bunch of knob heads we are.