Gorillaz review – a staggering hi-tech mini-festival from the magpie mind of Damon Albarn

Tottenham Hotspur Stadium, LondonA stream of high-profile guest stars included Johnny Marr, Little Simz, Shaun Ryder, Sparks, Yasiin Bey, Bootie Brown and Fatoumata Diawara Gorillaz’s first stadium show is quite the event. It’s a staggering hi-tech spectacle, a two-and-a-half hour mini-festival with a seemingly endless stream of high-profile guest stars, and its audacious ambition and military precision all stem from the fecund imagination and magpie mind of one man. Damon Albarn has never come across a genre of music that he doesn’t want to turn inside-out to see how it works. In recent years, he has turned Gorillaz from the mildly gimmicky virtual band he co-conceived with graphic artist Jamie Hewlett into a sprawling expression of his own musical curiosity and rampant eclecticism. The days of holograms of 2-D, Murdoc, Noodle and Russel being projected on stage are gone. Instead, Hewlett’s striking graphics play on giant screens over a stage on which Albarn, bearded in a combat jacket and beanie hat, plays the grinning ringmaster and MC of this dazzling circus. There are a stream of virtuoso Indian musicians, reflecting a motif of Gorillaz’s recent, ninth album, The Mou