Damon Albarn Assures Gorillaz Will Never Die

Gorillaz (Instagram @gorillaz)

JAKARTA - The genius musician behind the Gorillaz project, Damon Albarn, has made a firm statement regarding the future of the world's most iconic virtual band.

Albarn said Gorillaz was designed to live beyond the age of its creators by passing the baton of creativity to a new generation in the future.

For him, the cartoon character who became the face of Gorillaz is much more essential than the human being who works behind the scenes.

"We're going to pass it on to the next generation. Why not? These cartoon characters are much more important than the people behind the scenes, although those people also have a very vital role," Albarn said in a recent interview with the Associated Press.

Albarn's statement reaffirms Gorillaz's position as a flexible art entity. Since its debut in 2001, the band, which is dominated by the 2D characters - Murdoc Niccals, Noodle, and Russel Hobbs - has become a massive cross-genre collaboration platform.

Hewlett added that the idea of handing over creative control to a younger team is a topic they often talk about.

"It would be really nice to hand it over to a younger team in the future. We have discussed it a lot," said Hewlett.

He even compared the plan to the transition of legendary characters such as Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck who continue to live even though the original creator is gone.

Despite having a vision to continue, Albarn did not deny that every journey would come to an end for him personally. He hinted that one day he might just be behind the scenes before completely stepping away from the project.

"It might be interesting to just be in the background for the next generation to start, then I'll step back. There's an end point to all this," Albarn said.

"Maybe the secret is having a lot of unreleased recordings... and I have a lot of stock of it," he concluded.