Damon Albarn remembers first meeting with Terry Hall: the “coolest human being on Earth”
When The Specials singer Terry Hall passed away late last year at the age of 63, it was a considerable blow to legions of British musicians who were raised on his music. One of those musicians was Damon Albarn, who took some of Hall’s trademarks and incorporated them into his own style in bands like Blur and Gorillaz.
While sitting down with Radio X in a recent interview to discuss Gorillaz’s latest album, Cracker Island, Albarn opened up about his fandom for Hall. Specifically, Albarn mentioned that he had first met Hall while Albarn was still a teenager. After making his way down to the BBC offices in London to catch a taping of the countdown show Top of the Pops, Albarn found himself within reaching distance of Hall.
“I was a kid of 14,” Albarn recalled in the interview. “I somehow managed to get to a filming of Top Of The Pops, and I found myself standing underneath Terry Hall and thought, ‘This is the coolest human being on earth.'” This was after Hall and fellow Specials singers Lynval Golding and Neville Staple had already left The Specials to form their next band, Fun Boy Three. The trio made a number of appearances on Top of the Pops during their brief three-year run, so some internet sleuths should probably go through the footage and see if they can spot a young Albarn.
Albarn and Hall later became friends and even collaborated on a few different songs. Hall co-wrote and was a featured singer on Gorillaz’s 2001 single ‘911’ which was featured on the soundtrack to the film Bad Company. Albarn would help Hall with some of his solo material, including the songs ‘Chasing A Rainbow’, ‘Room Full Of Nothing’, and ‘Ten Eleven’.
Unfortunately, Hall’s death came as a surprise to Albarn. “He was a lovely, beautiful, fun person, and I didn’t know he was so ill,” Albarn said before adding: “so I never got a chance to say goodbye.” A few days after Hall passed away in December of 2022, the Gorillaz leader shared a tribute video on his social media accounts. In the memorial clip, Albarn performed a cover of The Specials’ 1980 single ‘Friday Night, Saturday Morning’ on piano. “Terry, you meant the world to me. I love you,” Albarn wrote in the video’s caption. The thoughtful ode would later be reprised when Albarn’s frequent collaborator, Trugoy the Dove of De La Soul, passed away earlier this year.
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