Damon Albarn wants to make music in Palestine and Israel
Damon Albarn, Blur frontman, founder of Africa Express and Gorillaz, has expressed a desire to make music in Palestine and Israel to bring greater communication between cultures through art.
Albarn began Africa Express in 2006 in response to the lack of African artists featured in Live 8 concerts, raising funds for Africa in the process. The collective recently recorded a new album, Bahidora, a 21-track album featuring 31 musicians recorded at incredible speed over two days.
In a new interview with The Times, the musician spoke on the 20th anniversary of the collective, noting, “If I have a hope of being of any use to anybody it is giving people a platform.”
It’s all well-thought-out and intentional. “I don’t want to be loud, to shout about freedom and atrocity. I want to stand equally with other cultures in a united, cultural reaction to populism and militarism.”
He continues this focus on culture, adding comments on the conflict in Gaza: “Because part of the huge issue of Palestine is the way that their identity is being eroded so brutally. So Africa Express could go into Palestine. 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.”
The Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions body usually prohibits this crossing of borders, despite there being no official ban on travelling to Israel. Consequently, Albarn didn’t appear to fully understand if the idea was a good one, adding, “I’m broadcasting a thought and my experience is that you put ideas out there and wait for them to come back to you — or not.”
He also argues that travel allows you to see and understand sociopolitical conflict at a deeper level: “I’ve been to Iran, so I have more of an idea of what Iran is like than a lot of people who virtue signal about it. My point is that you can’t have an opinion about a culture unless you’ve made some effort to communicate with it.”
Recently, Albarn conceded that the decades-long Britpop war between Blur and Oasis is now over. “I think we can officially say that Oasis won the battle, the war, the campaign, everything,” he stated, after which he wished his former rivals the best with their reunion.
Bahidora is set for release on July 18th.
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