Director

Jamie Hewlett

A new Gorillaz story has started - in the emergency room in a hospital in Los Angeles, where 2D is wheeled in by the cops. He's frazzled; Noodle is there, looking fraught; as is Russel, frozen in front of a TV; and there's no frickin' sign of Murdoc. But rather a lot of guest star Thundercat.[imgtoken data:1]No doubt about it, this is a very different kettle of fish to the easy vibe of Gorillaz'&nbsp;Song Machine&nbsp;project of last year. And the drama is back. So are Gorillaz in full 3D. Creator Jamie Hewlett has flipped&nbsp;back to a more visceral version of the band - in collaboration with Fx Goby at Nexus Studios.&nbsp;[imgtoken data:2]Cracker Island is&nbsp;the start of a new concept&nbsp;- where the band, newly relocated to Silverlake, recruit new members to join The Last Cult... And the new&nbsp;super stylised 3D look will&nbsp;pave the way for multi-platform activations, courtesy of a close creative collaboration between Hewlett and Goby. It's going to be fun...[imgtoken data:3]

United Kingdom

FX Goby

Jo Bierton

Nexus Studios

Ricky Patel

Mike Bell

Ruyi Meer

Ivan Grbin

Las Bandas Be Brave

Gorillaz ft Thundercat 'Cracker Island' by Jamie Hewlett, Fx Goby

Gorillaz - Cracker Island ft. Thundercat (Official Video)

The ninth and final episode from the Gorillaz' Song Machine series, and arguably Jamie Hewlett and co-directors Tim MCourt and Max Taylor have saved the best to last.If finding Elton John in cartoon form in Episode 7 was a surprise - how about his namesake Leee getting top billing as an angry sea monster, laying waste to a precious piece of Gorillaz history?The video for The Lost Chord is undoubtedly the most spectacular of the nine videos for the Song Machine album, but it is also in keeping with the rest of the series, particularly in exploring the increasing vulnerability of the previously devilish Murdoc. He has definitely met his match here, with the former frontman of 80s pop-soul outfit Imagination playing a chained Neptune-like creature who invades the band's poignant return&nbsp;to a now-desolate Plastic Beach with a momentous temper tantrum.&nbsp;This has been a brilliant series. As a body of work its as as good as anything in the Gorillaz canon. It's a real achievement by a consistent team of animators who have worked throughout the series. And the comic genius of Jamie Hewlett is still a bit underrated.&nbsp;&nbsp;

Tim McCourt

Max Taylor

Eva Dahlqvist

The Line

Samia Ahmed

Lisa A. Smith

Venla Linna

Lewis Crossfield

Time Based Arts

Natalie Steiner

Tom Kelly

Luke Goodrich

Max Halstead

Toby Goodyear

Benjy Kirkman

Jim Agnew

William Pope

Catherine Ladd

Natasha Lawes

Bethan Adams Stringer

Bernie Varela

Soul

Rock

Gorillaz ft Leee John 'The Lost Chord' (Ep. 9) by Jamie Hewlett, Tim McCourt and Max Taylor

Gorillaz - The Lost Chord ft. Leee John (Episode Nine)

Episode Seven of Gorillaz' ongoing Song Machine heralds their most famous and surprising collaborator yet in the (animated) form of Sir Elton, in a piano-playing duet with 2D, while a confused Murdoc chases the eponymous Pink Phantom.&nbsp;Like everything else in the Song Machine series it's fab, but just a little bit more fluffy and romantic, and funny, than anything else. And further confirmation of the genius of Jamie Hewlett, ably abetted by Tim McCourt and Max Taylor of The Line.&nbsp;It's almost as good as Elton's rendition of <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NCLagU-dr9A&amp;t=1s" target="_blank">"I'm Dill Danding" (sic)</a> during lockdown. But frankly, nothing is as good as that.

Gorillaz ft Elton John & 6LACK 'The Pink Phantom' by Jamie Hewlett, Tim McCourt, Max Taylor

Gorillaz - The Pink Phantom ft. Elton John & 6LACK (Episode Seven)

Back in the studio, killing&nbsp;time...

Hip Hop

Gorillaz ft. ScHoolboy Q 'PAC-MAN' (Ep. 5) by Jamie Hewlett

Gorillaz - PAC-MAN ft. ScHoolboy Q (Episode Five)

The latest 'episode' of Gorillaz's new project Song Machine keeps things simple. A series of headshots starting with guest artist Octavian, continuing with the familiar foursome, over mirrored POV car footage&nbsp;proves Jamie Hewlett's oft-repeated principle that less is more.&nbsp;Released during the Black Lives Matter protests following the death&nbsp;of George Floyd in Minneapolis, the video finishes with a quote from the great African-American writer James Baldwin: "Not everything that is faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced. It is certain, in any case, that ignorance, allied with power, is the most ferocious enemy justice can have."

Laurence Moss

Gorillaz ft Octavian 'Friday The 13th' (Ep. 4) by Jamie Hewlett, Tim McCourt & Max Taylor

Gorillaz – Friday 13th ft. Octavian (Episode Four)

2D and Murdoc go out for a motorbike ride in the desert&nbsp;- and Noodle is worried...

Gorillaz ft Peter Hook & Georgia 'Aries' (Ep. 3) by Jamie Hewlett

Gorillaz - Aries ft. Peter Hook & Georgia (Episode Three)

Episode Two of Gorillaz's latest project, Song Machine, follows the style of the first for Momentary Bliss, of combining live action of the real members of the band with their cartoon versions. This one is an absolute beauty, as Damon Albarn and guest vocalist, the Malian singer Fatoumata Diawara, take a speedboat trip on Lake Como.&nbsp;This works beautifully, and the reason is almost certainly is that Jamie Hewlett is back in charge of the video side, investing that special sauce on the characters we know and love.It's a wonderful six minutes of nice things happening, in live action, to a very groovy song.&nbsp;Meanwhile in the cartoon world, Murdoc appears to suffer&nbsp;an existential crisis...

World music

Gorillaz ft Fatoumata Diawara 'Désolé' (Ep. 2) by Jamie Hewlett

Gorillaz - Désolé ft. Fatoumata Diawara (Episode Two)

Episode 1 of Song Machine gives us a peek behind the curtain...

Gorillaz ft slowthai & Slaves 'Momentary Bliss' (Ep. 1) by Jamie Hewlett

Gorillaz - Momentary Bliss ft. slowthai & Slaves (Episode One)

Everybody&#39;s doing live videos these days - even Gorillaz.Well, almost. The gang is back as&nbsp;Gorillaz director/co-creator Jamie Hewlett and director Nicos Livesey at have teamed up once again&nbsp;to create the world&rsquo;s most famous virtual band&rsquo;s first ever performance video, for Tranz.In classic Gorillaz style it seamlessly fuses different forms of animation and graphic styles into one seamless whole, with very trippy and supercool results. So trippy, in fact, it may have confused the guys at Blinkink, who say &quot;We captured the band performing against green screen&quot;... Perhaps it was live after all.&nbsp;&nbsp;Nicos Livesey is known for creating innovative animation techniques incorporating physical mediums, such as the tapestry embroidery for this year&rsquo;s BBC World Cup trailer, and the old-school claymation of his &ldquo;Glore&rdquo; video for US punk band Radkey. He and Blinkink worked with Parisian animation house Eddy to get 2D, Murdoc (or his cousin), Noodle and Russel to take the unusual step of actually playing&nbsp;their instruments...&nbsp;

Nicos Livesey

Georgina Fillmore

Blinkink

Bart Yates

Stella Ramsden

Paul Moth

Warner Brothers

Indie

Gorillaz 'Tranz' by Jamie Hewlett And Nicos Livesey

Gorillaz-'Tranz'-by-Jamie-Hewlett-And-Nicos-Livesey

Just a year after Gorillaz&#39; star-studded fifth album Humanz was released, here comes a sixth - The Now Now, released later this month - and a new video for the first single Humility, with Jamie Hewlett&#39;s characters (including a new one) animated by Tim McCourt and Max Taylor at The Line.With live action shot at Venice Beach &ndash; directed by Evan Silver &ndash; McCourt and Taylor&#39;s excellent 2D animation brings the band character 2D to life, joyfully rollerskating through&nbsp;Venice&#39;s celebrated streetlife (sporting Beats headphones) while the other bandmembers hang out with the locals - including Murdoc&#39;s &#39;temporary replacement&#39;, the equally green Ace, casually ruining a game of hoops.&nbsp;&nbsp;And with a significant live action supporting role for a guitar-strumming Jack Black, who pops up throughout, this seems like an altogether simpler and sunnier, and more commercially-minded iteration of the World&#39;s Most Successful Virtual Act. Certainly a kinder one for the usually hapless 2D. Well, that is until drummer Russel (now back at normal size) puts a sudden, surprisingly spiteful&nbsp;end to 2D&#39;s skate fun.Can Russel be the new Murdoc? Good&nbsp;to see that some remainder of Hewlett&#39;s edge is still there...

Ryan Ennis

Franzi Nicolaus

James Duveen

Robert Rafalat

Ruffian

Robert Herman

Jack Black

Carlos Veron

Chris Yager

Scott Ludden

Amy Hanlin

Simone Grattarola

Gorillaz 'Humility' by Jamie Hewlett, Tim McCourt, Max Taylor, Evan Silver

Gorillaz - Humility (Official Video)

Well, what a treat this is. Gorillaz are back and so, of course, is Jamie Hewlett&#39;s wonderful cartoon version of the band. Murdoc, 2D, Noodle and Russel&nbsp;are at once familiar, but Hewlett never lets things stay entirely the same. There&#39;s always a slight variation on what&#39;s gone before - and this in this case he&#39;s managed to go both forward and back.In some ways they are more like the original (mostly 2D)&nbsp;version, that popped out at the turn of the century, would you believe. Russel, for instance, is not a 30 foot giant any more. But then they&#39;ve also entered a whole new dimension - the video comes in two versions, and one of them is the VR/360 version of the adventure that has the band enter what appears like the classic haunted house &ndash; again, shades of the original Clint Eastwood video &ndash; before slipping through a portal into deep space, next to Saturn.[imgtoken data:1]Produced once again through Passion Pictures, the VR version of Saturnz Barz was developed through Google&#39;s own VR studio, Google Spotlight Stories - and the video is &#39;supported by YouTube&#39;. And <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lVaBvyzuypw" target="_blank">the VR version</a> really is something to behold.&nbsp;

Cara Speller

Passion Pictures

Google Spotlight Stories

Gorillaz ft Popcaan 'Saturnz Barz (Spirit House)' by Jamie Hewlett

Gorillaz - Saturnz Barz (Spirit House)

Gorillaz - Saturnz Barz (Spirit House) 360

DoYaThing, the genre-blending single written, recorded and produced by Gorillaz, Andre 3000, and LCD Soundsystem's James Murphy (it's part of Converse's ongoing Three Artists. One Song series) now has an awesome video directed, of course, by Gorillaz co-creator Jamie Hewlett. 
Welcome to the Gorillaz house, where the day is just beginning. Not a good time to encounter Murdoc... Brilliant.

Simon Thirlaway

Seb Monk

HSI London

Neil Riley

Gary Walker

James Tillett

Gorillaz, Andre 3000, James Murphy 'DoYaThing' by Jamie Hewlett

It picks up where <a href="http://www.promonews.tv/2010/03/02/gorillaz%E2%80%99-stylo-by-jamie-hewlett-and-pete-candeland/" target="_blank">Stylo</a> left off, and although there&#39;s no live action or a Bruce Willis, there is a seafaring tale probably involving dream sequences, and a stellar cast of guest performers. Travelling in state of the art submersibles are (in order of appearance) Lou Reed, Gruff Rhys from Super Furry Animals, Snoop Dogg, Paul Simenon and Mick Jones from The Clash, and De La Soul - so about half of all those who turned up at last week&#39;s Glastonbury show. The animation crew of over 40 people consisted of two teams of 2D and CG animators / compositors, and The band characters are mostly 2D drawn animation with CG backgrounds and effects. But there are no rules really, not any more.

Jamie Hewlett

Director

Videos featuring Jamie Hewlett

2022 (1)

2020 (7)

2018 (2)

2017 (1)

2012 (1)

2010 (1)

Popular content

Is this your profile?

Feedback

Latest Videos