Fire Coming Out Of The Monkey's Head

Fire Coming Out Of The Monkey's Head
Fire Coming Out Of The Monkey's Head (Demon Days Live)
Fire Coming Out Of The Monkey's Head (Demon Days Live, with Dennis Hopper)
Fire Coming Out Of The Monkey's Head (Escape To Plastic Beach Tour)

The following is an edited transcript from an interview Gorillaz did with Cass Browne for their autobiography, "Rise Of The Ogre":

"Russel: The tale on this track is narrated by Mr. Dennis Hopper. Noodle ran into him at some award show and it turns out he knew some Gorillaz tracks already. We told him that we were working on (a new album, "Demon Days") and then took it from there. He came down to the studio for an afternoon and y'know, put his presence on the record.

Noodle: The reason why we chose Dennis Hopper was because we felt there was a similarity between the time (his movie) "Easy Rider" was filmed and the climate "Demon Days" was recorded in. During the late sixties the world was in a transitional period where the accepted wisdom of the authorities was being challenged and people were doubting the political decisions of their governments. In "Easy Rider", Dennis's character perfectly reflected that spirit of opposition, or at least the ability to question the authority of certain institutions."

"Fire Coming Out Of The Monkey's Head" (which I will refer to as "Monkey" for the sake of convenience) is a cautionary tale told by legendary actor Dennis Hopper and Damon Albarn as 2D. The story of "Monkey" is centered around two tribes of characters; The Happyfolk, a peaceful species who lived by a mountain called Monkey and The Strangefolk, an invasive species who destroy the town so they can get to the jewels within the mountain called Monkey. It was the last song recorded for "Demon Days" and plays a part in wrapping up the album's statement on politics, war, religion and the environment in time for the album's conclusive finale.

The instrumental to this song is a Ennio Morricone type "Western soundtrack" song done mostly on quirky and strange electronic instruments similar to that of the band Wall Of Voodoo. The beat is mainly centered around a loop of Jason Cox's bass guitar, Damon Albarn's upstroked electric guitar and James Dring's drum machine. As the song progresses, multiple layers of countermelodies are added by Damon's many synthesizers and a choral hum done by Damon and The London Community Gospel Choir accompanies Dennis Hopper's narration, giving the song even more of an old school Western vibe.

Now if it wasn't obvious already, the tale being told is meant to be a parallel to the Iraq War, The Happyfolk are the natives of Iraq and The Strangefolk are the U.S. military. Damon explains this in his first section while playing a chilling acoustic guitar, "Falling out of aeroplanes, and hiding out in holes. Waiting for the sunset to come, people going home. Jump out from behind them and shoot them in the head. Now everybody's dancing the dance of the dead, the dance of the dead, the dance of the dead." As Damon says, The Strangefolk came out of airplanes and took cover in holes, similar to the trenches that soldiers usually "hide" in during battle. Now not all soldiers did this, but there were a lot of soldiers who took innocent lives during this war. That's what Damon is talking about during this part, now some of The Happyfolk are dead thanks to the horrible actions of some of The Strangefolk. Their loved ones mourn the loss of their lost friends, or as Damon puts it, "dancing the dance of the dead", making reference to The Day Of The Dead, a traditional Mexican holiday where they celebrate the recently departed.

As Dennis Hopper's story progresses, The Strangefolk mine the mountain called Monkey for it's jewels, tearing apart it's structure until soon "fire" leaks out of it in volcanic fashion. This "fire" destroys the town and leaves "nothing", "there were no screams, there was no time". Now while Iraq still exists (albeit in a somewhat tarnished form), Dennis Hopper is referring to the real reason President George W. Bush forced America into this pointless war, oil. The government wanted to mine for oil in Iraq, similar to how The Strangefolk wanted the jewels from the mountain called Monkey. Soon many oil spills occurred, destroying many parts of the land near by. This is the "fire coming out of the monkey's head", oil spilling on to the land and tarnishing almost anything it came in contact with, all because of the greed of the American government, I mean, The Strangefolk.

After a brief moment of silence, Damon starts singing again with his acoustic guitar. While he sings in this stripped down setting, he taps his foot giving this outro section a similar vibe akin to The Beatles' "Blackbird", another protest song that uses metaphoric imagery to convey it's message. Damon as 2D leaves us with this message, "Oh little town in USA, your time has come to see all the things you think you are. But where were you when it all came down on me? Did you call me? No no no". 2D formally confirms that we were meant to draw the parallel we did in the opening line by directly referring to the USA. He says that it's time for the people there to realize that the war their leaders caused was for no reason other than greed and profit. It's a call for people to start questioning their authority and rebel. But later in the verse, 2D's begins talking to someone else.

Throughout this album, 2D has been trying to come to terms with how to cope and get better in this time of chaos, in these "Demon Days". And near the end of the first half of the album, 2D began to turn to god for answers, but alas he heard nothing. Where was his savior when the bad times got to him? Not a word was said, he didn't respond to his call. A wind blows through the air, as we transition into the story's true ending...

The song has been played live only a couple times so far. It was, of course, in the "Demon Days Live" showcases where the more live and symphonic instrumentation like Cass Browne's drums, Damon Albarn's piano and the in-house string section, Demon Strings, gave the song more power. At the last couple of shows in New York, Dennis Hopper joined the group on stage to perform it live. He was obviously nervous as the performance showed and footage from Gorillaz documentary, "Bananaz", clarified (he was probably afraid of messing up something he did while back with a group whom he respected at the legendary Apollo Theater). Nevertheless, he did a good job with it. After his death in 2010, the band played in tribute to him as a part of their encore at their Glastonbury show (they obviously got pretty close, as Dennis Hopper went to the 2006 Grammys with them and may have even thrown them a celebratory party for their nomination at his house), backing the song up with clips from his movie "Easy Rider", instead of the usual visual Jamie Hewlett made. The song was sound checked during one of the shows on the band's 2017 "Humanz Tour", but as of now was never played. "Fire Coming Out Of The Monkey's Head" obviously means a lot to Damon, and is a vital and instrumental part of the master work that is "Demon Days".