| “ | Is the rise of an eastern sun gonna be good for everyone? | „ |
Hong Kong is a song by Gorillaz and the fifth track from their second compilation album, D-Sides. It was originally recorded in early September 2005 for the charity compilation album Help!: A Day In The Life by War ChildW, released just a few days later, before being reworked for D-Sides in 2007.
The reworked version of the song features an additional string section not present on the original recording, played by the Demon Strings, and a zither played by Chen Wei-Man. Among the Demon Strings, the cello was played by Isabelle Dunn, double bass by Al Mobbs, violas by Emma Owens and Stella Page, and violins by Alice Pratley, Antonia Pagulatos, Kotono Sato and Oliver Langford.
Background and Recording
| “ | ‘Hong Kong.’ I love that song very dearly. That’s one of my best songs. I feel like it carries a lot of poignancy now. Especially the bit at the end about the DJ being the last one to leave. That’s why writing songs the way I do, there are moments where they have huge clarity, and then they become weird again. | „ |
| ~ Damon Albarn, The Best, Worst, and Weirdest of Gorillaz |
Hong Kong was originally commissioned to Damon Albarn by War Child, an international non-profit and non-governmental organization, to be featured on their upcoming charity album. Damon had already recorded a song for War Child with Blur ten years prior for a different charity album, simply entitled 'Help', but decided to do something different this time around while he was staying in China working on the Monkey: Journey To The West opera. He recorded the song, originally a tune which he had been working on during the summer of 2005, with zither player Chen Wei-Man during an afternoon in Hong Kong and sent it over to the organization.
Albarn intended the song to be released under his own name but did not specify it when sending it over to the organization, leading it to be mistakenly labeled as a Gorillaz one instead and labeling it this way on the album without his prior knowledge. Albarn has since stated that he believes this was ultimately a better decision and was pleased with the end result of the tune.
Original War Child Version
In the original version of Hong Kong from Help!: A Day In The Life, the violin accompaniment and strings section is completely absent. In fact, there was little to no knowledge of the track's existence at the time due to the lack of promotion for the song by the band. The song only truly gained fame when it was performed live as part of the Manchester Opera House concert, where Damon stepped out of the shadows to take centre stage, as "it wasn't really a Gorillaz tune - it's just been tagged as one". In addition, at this concert, the zither was played by a different person, a woman named Zeng Zhen.
Before the song was reworked for D-Sides, it was also posted to the band's official MySpace account on 18 December 2006 as a b-side track to Stop The Dams, released as a digital-exclusive minor single. Outside of the band's MySpace account, however, it remained exclusive to Help!: A Day In The Life. As for the Live at Manchester version, this recording of the song was later included as a bonus track on certain reissues of Demon Days and on the digital Special Edition of D-Sides.[1]
Live Visuals
The live performance of the song at the Manchester Opera House was accompanied by exclusive live visuals made specifically for that concert, composed of footage from the city of Hong Kong at nighttime with a yellow tint over it. It was later released alongside the other Demon Days ones as part of the Demon Days LIVE DVD.
Lyrics
(To fierce)
Lord, hear me now
Junk boats and English boys
Crashing out in super marts
Electric fences and guns
You swallow me
I'm a pill on your tongue
Here on the nineteenth floor
The neon lights make me calm
And late in a star's life
It begins to explode
And all the people in a dream
Wait for the machine
To pick the shit up, leave it clean
Kid, hang over here
What you learning in school?
Is the rise of an eastern sun
Gonna be good for everyone?
The radio station disappears
Music turned into thin air
The DJ was the last to leave
She had well conditioned hair
Was beautiful, but nothing really was there
Videos
Availability
Original Version
- Help!: A Day In The Life charity album (all versions);
- Stop The Dams MySpace-exclusive minor single.
Reworked Version
- D-Sides (all formats except Chinese releases);
- D-Sides 2-track sampler promo CD.
Live at Manchester Opera House
- Demon Days Live At The Manchester Opera House (DVD and digital album);
- Demon Days (Japanese Premium Edition);
- D-Sides (Digital Special Edition).
Live Visuals
- Demon Days LIVE DVD;
- Unofficial YouTube reuploads.
Trivia
- With a length of 7:15, Hong Kong is the second longest Gorillaz song ever released (excluding remixes), only being surpassed by DoYaThing, running 13:04.
- It was, however, the longest Gorillaz song yet when it was first released.
- In an October 2020 interview to VultureW magazine, Damon Albarn stated that Hong Kong is his personal favourite Gorillaz b-side.[2]
Gallery
