Damon Albarn — frontman of Blur, co-creator of Gorillaz, and founder of the multicultural collective Africa Express — has long treated music as something more than sound. It's a way of standing somewhere. Lately, that's meant standing with Palestinians, loudly and repeatedly, in a way most artists of his stature choose not to.
Damon Albarn: Transcending Politics
DAMON ALBARN
BLUR · GORILLAZ · AFRICA EXPRESS
an antakly projects dispatch
What It Looks Like
What It Looks Like
When Artists Show Up
Damon Albarn has spent three decades using music as a force for unity. Right now, that means Palestine.
"Recognising the Genocide"
In an interview with Channel 4 News, Albarn was direct in a way few musicians his size allow themselves to be. "I think it's about not denying the legitimacy of Palestine, not denying the historical presence of Palestinians, and recognising the genocide that is taking place there," he said. "We cannot deny the Palestinians their existence, which is what's going on at the moment. It's just wrong. Palestinians belong there and you can't just kick them out. It's not acceptable."
Watch: Albarn's Channel 4 News interview
The Most Important Part
On September 17, 2025, Albarn took the stage at Together for Palestine — a benefit concert at London's OVO Arena Wembley, organised by Brian Eno, that brought more than 150 artists and cultural figures together in a single room for one cause. The night raised close to £1.5 million for Palestinian-led humanitarian organisations.
Albarn appeared twice. First alongside Eno, Paul Weller, Adnan Joubran, Hot Chip's Alexis Taylor, and Nadine Shah for a piece composed specifically for the night. Later, he returned to lead a medley of Palestinian traditional songs with the London Arab Orchestra and the Juzour Dance Collective — a moment that drew one of the loudest responses of the evening — before joining Gorillaz for a live preview of "Damascus," with Yasiin Bey and Omar Souleyman.
The Together for Palestine lineup — one of more than a dozen artists sharing a single stage for one fund
Gorillaz's stage visuals during the tour that followed
Not Just Wembley
Wembley wasn't a one-off. At Glastonbury in 2024, in a surprise appearance alongside Bombay Bicycle Club, Albarn asked the crowd directly: "Are you pro-Palestine? Do you feel that's an unfair war?" — met with a wave of cheers. And off stage, he's put his own name behind Small Steps Project's Celebrity Shoe Auction for Gaza, donating sneakers alongside dozens of other public figures to raise humanitarian funds one pair at a time.
Small Steps Project's Celebrity Shoe Auction — humanitarian aid, one donated pair at a time
Not a Slogan
What separates Albarn's position from a reflexive one is that it isn't uniform. When Bob Vylan led Glastonbury's West Holts crowd in a chant of "death, death to the IDF" — a moment that triggered a criminal investigation and cost the band their U.S. visas — Albarn didn't cheer it on. He called it "one of the most spectacular misfires I've seen in my life."
His own version of solidarity points somewhere else: toward contact, not just condemnation. "Africa Express could go into Palestine," he's said. "It's not about politics, it's about culture. And so I would also want to go to Israel and bring people together. If I was asked to go to Russia, I would go. I'd go to Ukraine too." It's a harder position to hold than picking a side and staying there — and arguably a more honest one.
The Bigger Mission
This is, in a sense, what Albarn has been building toward for two decades. Africa Express — the collective he founded to connect Western and African musicians as equals — released its sixth album, Bahidorá, this year: 21 tracks recorded in Mexico with more than 30 artists from four continents, made in the days following a headline set at the Bahidorá Festival.
"We formed Africa Express to break down the citadel of world music and make everything more human and less exotic," Albarn has said. "I want to stand equally with other cultures in a united reaction to populism and militarism." Mexican vocalist Luisa Almaguer, who sings alongside him on the album, described the recording process more simply: "a musical orgy." South African artist Moonchild Sanelly called it freedom from the usual commercial constraints — "just letting the vibes vibe."
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Working with musicians from different cultures is like learning a new language. It opens your eyes to things you'd never imagine.Damon Albarn
Why It Matters
Music has never been separate from resistance — from the blues to "We Shall Overcome," from anti-war folk to punk, hip-hop, and techno, genres built inside marginalised communities that never fully let go of that root. Today the throughline continues: Kendrick Lamar's reckonings with racial inequality, Massive Attack, Kneecap, and Fontaines D.C.'s solidarity with Palestine, Beyoncé's celebration of queer Black joy, Olivia Rodrigo's own vocal advocacy for Palestinians. Festivals like Glastonbury have become platforms for protest as much as performance — even as backlash pushes some artists back toward silence.
Not every song needs a politics, and not every dancefloor needs a cause. But when an artist with Albarn's reach chooses to use a stage that way, it matters — not because it solves anything on its own, but because it makes the cost of staying silent a little more visible for everyone else with a stage of their own.
Albarn once said that "creativity is about finding the magic in the moment." Sometimes, if an artist is willing to use the platform they've spent a career building, that magic turns into something closer to a movement.
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