Having conquered music with albums like Demon Days, Humanz and The Now Now, there was one obvious new direction for the world’s leading virtual band to take — leading to the announcement of Gorillaz Almanac, including the first official comic strips featuring the group, to be released later this year.
Described as a “a full color, one-of-a-kind, fun-packed, 120-plus page, sideways homage to two glorious decades of Gorillaz,” the Almanac will include guest appearances from Gorillaz’ collaborators past and present, with a mix of content including puzzles, games, features and — perhaps most excitingly of all for fans of the group — brand-new Gorillaz comics by band co-creator (and the co-creator of the iconic Tank Girl, as well) Jamie Hewlett.
The title will be published by Z2 Comics in three versions — a standard edition, a deluxe edition and a super deluxe edition. Each copy will come with a CD of music from the first season of the band’s irregular series of new tracks, Song Machine.
“Every fan of comics and animation has dreamed of seeing the Gorillaz make their comic book debut, with the Z2 team chief among them,” Z2 publisher Josh Frankel said Tuesday in a statement accompanying the announcement. “The artwork, the music, and the mythos all add up to what is destined to be one of our most buzzed about releases in history, and when fans see just what we have planned, I know everyone will agree it was well worth the wait.”
Gorillaz Almanac is set to be released in October and is available now for pre-order.
