Gorillaz are an English virtual band created in 1998 by musician Damon Albarn and artist Jamie Hewlett. The band consists of four animated members: 2-D (lead vocals, keyboards), Murdoc Niccals (bass guitar), Noodle (guitar, keyboards), and Russel Hobbs (drums and percussion). These members are fictional and are not personas of any "real life" musicians involved in the project. Their fictional universe is explored through the band's music videos, as well as a number of other short cartoons.

The band's first release was the EP Tomorrow Comes Today, released in 2000. The band's first single was "Clint Eastwood" and was released on 5 March 2001, reaching No. 4 in the UK. It was produced by hip hop producer Dan the Automator and originally featured UK rap group Phi Life Cypher, but the version that appears on the album features American rapper Del the Funky Homosapien, known on the album as Del tha' Ghost Rapper, a spirit in the band's drummer Russel Hobbs. The Phi Life Cypher version of "Clint Eastwood" appears on the B-side album G Sides. Later that same month, their first full-length album, the self-titled Gorillaz, was released, producing four singles: "Clint Eastwood", "19-2000", "Tomorrow Comes Today", and "Rock the House". In June 2001, "19-2000" charted at No. 6 in the UK, and the song was used as the title theme for EA Sports FIFA video game FIFA Football 2002.  The end of the year brought the song "911", a collaboration between Gorillaz and hip hop group D12 (without Eminem) and Terry Hall about the September 11 attacks. Meanwhile, G Sides, a compilation of the B-sides from the Tomorrow Comes Today EP and first three singles, was released in Japan on 12 December 2001 and quickly followed with international releases in early 2002. Gorillaz performed at the 2002 Brit Awards in London on 22 February, appearing in 3D animation on four large screens along with rap accompaniment by Phi Life Cypher. The band were nominated for four Brit Awards, including Best British Group, Best British Album and British Breakthrough Act, but did not win any awards.  In November 2002, a DVD titled Phase One: Celebrity Take Down was released, giving the phase its name. The DVD contains the four Phase One promos, the abandoned video for "5/4", the Charts of Darkness documentary, the five Gorilla Bitez (comedic shorts starring the band characters), a tour of the website by the MEL 9000 server and more. The DVD's menu was designed much like the band's website and depicts an abandoned Kong Studios.  Rumours were circulating at this time that the Gorillaz team were busy preparing a film, but Hewlett said that the film project had been abandoned: "We lost all interest in doing it as soon as we started meeting with studios and talking to these Hollywood executive types, we just weren't on the same page. We said, fuck it, we'll sit on the idea until we can do it ourselves, and maybe even raise the money ourselves."

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