And Finally Artist News

Damon Albarn performs for robots

By | Published on Tuesday 29 July 2014

Damon Albarn

Damon Albarn played to an audience of 50 at Japan’s National Museum of Emerging Science and Innovation in Tokyo last week. Sadly, he couldn’t pull in quite enough humans, so the numbers were made up by a couple of androids.

OK, yes, I think having robots there was intentional, not a ticketing issue. It seemingly had something to do with Albarn’s solo album, ‘Everyday Robots’. Watching along with their human counterparts were the life-like Otonaroid and “more abstract” Telenoid.

And before you’re all like, “Hey, those seats could have been filled by proper humans”, just remember that sort of talk is what will kickstart the inevitable robot uprising. Also, they seemed to enjoy it. Otonaroid, at least, apparently danced and hummed along, which is probably more than could be said for some of the humans.

Speaking to The Creators Project, Albarn said: “It was interesting performing alongside the androids. While they definitely look artificial up close, when seen at a distance they look like normal people. They’re fake, but they’re also real. I mean, they’re definitely there. But, I don’t think the fact that robots are completely alien will ever change. So in that sense technology is perhaps a bit melancholic”.

See photos from the performance here.



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