aaamusic | On 26, Jun 2010

Gorillaz were joined by a series of guests, including Lou Reed, Snoop Dogg and Shaun Ryder, as they headlined Glastonbury’s Pyramid Stage yesterday night (June 25).

Damon Albarn’s band were replacing U2 at the Somerset bash, after their singer Bono suffered a back injury and required surgery last month, forcing the cancellation.

The collective featured The Clash’s guitarist and bassist Mick Jones and Paul Simonon, plus a strings, brass band and Albarn himself on piano and vocals.

The group then welcomed De La Soul, Bobby Womack, The Fall’s Mark E Smith, Bashy and Kano to join them onstage at various points in the show.

Playing ’Welcome To The World Of The Plastic Beach’ early in the set, Gorillaz relied on screens featuring Snoop Dogg, despite the rapper playing the same stage earlier that day.

The no show led to huge surprise among fans – however, the rapper eventually appeared during last song of the night, performing the rap on ’Clint Eastwood’, dropping the words of his own hit ’Drop It Like It’s Hot’ over the song in place of Del The Funky Homosapien who performed on the original.

The set also featured Bobby Womack on vocals on ’Stylo’ – although Mos Def, who had been due to join him, had to cancel his festival appearence due to a family death – and ’Cloud Of Unknowing’, while Bashy and Kano rapped on ’White Flag’.

De La Soul appeared live for ’Superfast Jellyfish’ and ’Feel Good Inc’, while Happy Mondays singer Ryder reprised his singing role live on 2005 UK Number One single ’Dare’.

Elsewhere in the set, Mark E Smith performed vocals on ’Glitter Freeze’ – although he needed a little help, reading his lyrics from a printout.

Reed, meanwhile, was making his debut live performance with Gorillaz, having contributed vocals to ‘Some Kind Of Nature’ on recent album ’Plastic Beach’. He arrived on stage mid-set unannounced, playing a guitar solo before the song kicked in and he sang.

Albarn was headlining the festival on the Pyramid Stage for the second year in a row, having closed last year’s event as frontman of Blur . He was clearly enjoying his performance with Gorillaz, leading a huge singalong of ‘Pirate Jet’ before the four-song encore ended the show and the first night of musical action at Glastonbury 2010.

Gorillaz played:

‘Orchestra Intro’
‘Welcome To The World Of The Plastic Beach’
‘Last Living Souls’
‘O Green World’
‘Kids With Guns’
‘Stylo’
‘On Melancholy Hill’
‘Rhinestone Eyes’
‘Broken’
‘Empire Ants’
‘Dirty Harry’
‘White Flag’
‘Superfast Jellyfish’
‘Dare’
‘Glitter Freeze’
‘Some Kind Of Nature’
‘El Mañana’
‘Cloud Of Unknowing’
‘Pirate Jet’
‘To Binge’
‘Fire Coming Out’
‘Feel Good Inc’
‘Clint Eastwood’