Humanz recording

Recording sessions for the band’s fifth studio album, Humanz , began in late 2015 and continued through 2016, taking place in London, New York City, Paris and Jamaica. Albarn enlisted the American hip-hop and house producer Anthony Khan, known by his stage name the Twilite Tone , to co-produce the album. Albarn chose Khan from a list of possible producers compiled by Parlophone , the band’s record label after Albarn and Khan spoke via Skype. Humanz was also co-produced by Remi Kabaka Jr , a friend of Albarn who had worked with him in the non-profit musical organisation Africa Express and also has been the voice actor for the Gorillaz virtual band member Russel Hobbs since 2000. In conceptualising the album, Albarn and Khan envisioned Humanz as being the soundtrack for “a party for the end of the world”, with Albarn specifically imagining a future in which Donald Trump won the 2016 US presidential election as context for the album’s narrative, explaining, “Let’s use that as a kind of dark fantasy for this record, let’s imagine the night Donald Trump wins the election and how we’re all going to feel that night.” Khan stated that “The idea of Donald Trump being president allowed us to create a narrative together. I suggested that the album should be about joy, pain and urgency. That was to be our state of mind before we even touched a keyboard or an MPC . Especially in American music, dare I say black music, there’s a way of communicating joy that at the same time allows you to feel the struggle the person has been through. And the urgency is there because something needs to be done. So that was the mantra. I wanted to blend Damon, a Briton, with the joy and pain and struggle that African-American music can express.” Humanz again featured a large cast of featured artists, including Popcaan , Vince Staples , DRAM , Jehnny Beth , Pusha T , Peven Everett , Danny Brown , Grace Jones and Mavis Staples , among others. The first track from the album released publicly was ” Hallelujah Money ” featuring Benjamin Clementine , released on 20 January 2017 with an accompanying video featuring Clementine. While not an official single, Albarn explained that the band chose to release the track on the day of Trump’s inauguration because “It was meant to be something sung at the imaginary inauguration of Donald Trump, which turned out to be the real inauguration of Donald Trump, so we released it because we had imagined that happening and it did happen.”