Gnarls Barkley is an American soul duo, composed of singer-songwriter CeeLo Green and producer Danger Mouse. They have released two studio albums, St. Elsewhere (2006) and The Odd Couple (2008). St. Elsewhere was recorded on the Warner Music UK label, and contained their hit single "Crazy" which topped at number two on the US Hot 100, and topped the charts in the UK. It was also nominated at the 2007 Grammy Awards for Record of the Year, and was platinum certified for shipping over 1,000,000 records.

In 2006, Sanjiv Bhattacharya interviewed the duo for The Guardian and asked about where their band name came from, to which Green replied: "You ask me why we're called Gnarls Barkley and I'm asking you 'why not?'...The name Gnarls Barkley isn't anchored down. It's a drifter. A High Plains drifter, I might add". Danger Mouse said: "There's no story behind it...The name doesn't have anything to do with anything". Although many people believe that their name has something to do with former NBA player Charles Barkley, the duo dismiss that idea. Sanjiv asked them about it, saying "Not even Charles Barkley, the basketball player?", to which Danger Mouse replied: "Nope. It's just like everything else on this record. There was no conscious decision about stuff". According to a Billboard article: "Burton and CeeLo have been cagey about what the name of the act means, and each live performance is an opportunity to play dress-up as tennis players, astronauts and chefs, among many other get-ups. The costuming extends to photo shoots, as Burton and Cee Lo would rather impersonate characters from such films as Back to the Future or Wayne's World. They also have dressed up as characters from films A Clockwork Orange and Napoleon Dynamite. About Gnarls Barkley, Green said in an interview: That is that electric industrial Euro soul, that's what I call it... if I can call it anything. It truly is shapeless and formless. My style and my approach is still water, and it runs so deep. So, with that project I got a chance to be a lil' zany, of course a continuation of eccentricity, abstract and vague, and all of those wonderful things that make art exactly what it is. And that's subject to interpretation. As far as the artiste himself, it does cater to and extend the legacy of Cee Lo Green, and showcase the diversity and range and intention of Cee Lo Green. It is a great project that I'm very, very proud of.

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