IN: 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."

What were some of the other albums?

OUT: 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.

IN: Jackson was born in the borough of Queens, New York City, and raised in its South Jamaica neighborhood by his mother, Sabrina. A drug dealer, Sabrina raised Jackson until she died in a mysterious fire when Jackson was 8. After his mother's death and his father's departure Jackson was raised by his grandmother. He began boxing at about age 11, and when he was 14 a neighbor opened a boxing gym for local youth. "

On May 24, 2000, Jackson was attacked by a gunman outside his grandmother's former home in South Jamaica. After getting into a friend's car, he was asked to return to the house to get some jewelry; his son was in the house, and his grandmother was in the front yard. After Jackson returned to the back seat of the car, another car pulled up nearby; an assailant walked up and fired nine shots at close range with a 9mm handgun. Jackson was shot in the hand, arm, hip, both legs, chest and left cheek. His facial wound resulted in a swollen tongue, the loss of a wisdom tooth and a slightly slurred voice; his friend was wounded in the hand. They were driven to a hospital, where Jackson spent thirteen days. The alleged attacker, Darryl Baum, Mike Tyson's close friend and bodyguard, was killed three weeks later. Jackson recalled the shooting: "It happens so fast that you don't even get a chance to shoot back .... I was scared the whole time ... I was looking in the rear-view mirror like, 'Oh shit, somebody shot me in the face! It burns, burns, burns.'" In his autobiography, From Pieces to Weight: Once upon a Time in Southside Queens, he wrote: "After I got shot nine times at close range and didn't die, I started to think that I must have a purpose in life ... How much more damage could that shell have done? Give me an inch in this direction or that one, and I'm gone". After using a walker for six weeks, Jackson was fully recovered after five months. When he left the hospital he stayed in the Poconos with his girlfriend and son, and his workout regime helped him develop a muscular physique. In the hospital Jackson signed a publishing deal with Columbia Records before he was dropped from the label and blacklisted by the recording industry because of his song, "Ghetto Qu'ran". Unable to work in a U.S. studio, he went to Canada. With business partner Sha Money XL, Jackson recorded over thirty songs for mixtapes to build a reputation. In a HitQuarters interview, Marc Labelle of Shady Records A&R said that Jackson used the mixtape circuit to his advantage: "He took all the hottest beats from every artist and flipped them with better hooks. They then got into all the markets on the mixtapes and all the mixtape DJs were messing with them." Jackson's popularity increased, and in 2002 he released the mixtape Guess Who's Back?. He then released 50 Cent Is the Future backed by G-Unit, a mixtape revisiting material by Jay-Z and Raphael Saadiq.

did he survive?

OUT:
Jackson was fully recovered after five months.