Damon Albarn Unloads on The Rolling Stones for New ‘Hackney Diamonds’ Album, Objectifying Sydney Sweeney: “It’s All Nonsense”

Selling around 200 million albums throughout their career on stage, Rolling Stone considered The Rolling Stones one of the greatest bands of all time. For over the past 60 years, the band toured all over the world, sharing their music with fans. While most praise the band for being iconic and surviving the rock era, Damon Albarn recently criticized the group for their newest album Hackney Diamonds, and how they are the worst at being themselves. 

Known for his musical contribution to the mesmerizing band Gorillaz, Albarn seemed to hold nothing back when discussing The Rolling Stones, their new album, and even the music video for “Angry,” which he accused the band of objectifying Sydney Sweeney in. Speaking with Les Inrockuptibles, the artist first to aim at Hackney Diamonds, claiming, “My family lives in Hackney and the way they showed up at the Hackney Empire venue really me off. They’ve never did a thing in Hackney, they’ve never played there, never contributed to anything. They just showed up. It’s all nonsense.”

“What The Hell Is This”

Continuing with his tirade against The Rolling Stones, Albarn pointed to the band’s new music video “Angry”, which featured actress Sydney Sweeney. Suggesting the group objectified her, the artist noted, “I listened to their new song and watched this horrible music video showing them at different stages of their lives on billboards. And this young woman objectified. What the hell is this? There’s something completely disconnected.”

Albarn considered The Rolling Stones to never being “anything other than the Rolling Stones. I love the idea of devoting your life to one thing, in search of the sublime. But the truth is, they’ve become worse.” He added, “Worse at persisting to stay themselves. That’s something I don’t understand. Making exactly the same music but not that good. There must be no joy in doing something like this.”

[RELATED: Damon Albarn Apologizes for Attempting to Discredit Taylor Swift’s Songwriting]

While Albarn took issue with the band, online, fans seemed to praise the “Angry” music video, writing, “The Beatles and the Rolling Stones back on the charts together again 2023. Phenomenal !!!!” Another person wrote, “This song is so bad ass. 80 years old and rocking harder than a 20 year old. Right on Stones!”

(Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images for Coachella)